Recently in Ayuko2's Weekly Plans F10 Category

Julianna Lead Teaching

Overview
The end of the year is coming up fast, but things are busy as ever in the classroom. Children are as anxious as we are to enjoy the beautiful weather. We have found many opportunities to take small groups outside during the day (feeding the birds, collecting bugs, etc.) and will continue to seek those opportunities to foster relationships among the students. With a focus on the end of the year and eventual transition to the "big kids' classroom" we will begin to utilize some of their daily routines. We also hope to take small groups to their classrooms, so children can see what to expect. In the classroom, a dramatic play stage will be set up in the loft to encourage the natural performers in our classroom, and help others out of their shells. We will also have a body-comparison station at the science table for children to compare hand and feet size, height and weight. Remember, the All School Pizza Party is on Tuesday, May 24th. We hope you can come--it's sure to be a rollicking good time!

Large Group

Large groups this week will focus on music and movement through the use of instruments (drums or shakers) and scarves or streamers. This will encourage the performance area of our classroom to be used. All children will begin to practice sitting on a carpet square, a routine in the big kids' classroom. This will be a big change for the children, but we think they are ready for it. We will also use songs, story telling and book reading to enhance focus on other areas in the classroom.

Expressive Arts

Art Table
Materials: Window pane and plexiglass for painting on
Rationale: To give children an opportunity to paint somewhere besides the easel and to foster a community effort on a large group work. To experiment with light that shines through the plexiglass and window pane.
Skills: Turn taking, creative expression, fine motor practice, cause and effect, prediction, and color mixing

Easel
Materials: Daubers and other non-paint markers
Rationale: Give children the opportunity to use new media and experiment with something new.
Skills: Fine motor practice, creative expression, turn-taking, and cause and effect

Sensory
Earth Clay:
Materials: Earth clay and tools to manipulate it: pounders, rolling pins and scooping tools.
Rationale: To encourage children to practice motor skills through manipulating the (sometimes tough) clay. To encourage problem-solving and scientific thinking skills through the use of a novel material.
Skills: Fine motor, comparison, hypothesis, communication, problem solving, symbolic representation, and trial and error.

Sand Table:
Materials: Sand, small animal models, insect models, and items for creating their habitats: faux foliage and wood.
Rationale: To help children make connections between the creatures we have learned about in books to a simulation in real life. To renew interest in sand as a material, since it's been a long time since having had it.
Skills: Cooperative skills, collaboration, turn-taking, role-playing, communication, fine motor, creative expression and dramatic play.

Science
Materials: Measuring tape, clipboards, hand sizes, feet sizes, paper on wall to record height, scale and face-paint/mirrors.
Rationale: To give children the opportunity to learn about their bodies through sensory exploration and comparison. Children will check height, weight and hand and foot size through measurement. We will also continue having face-paint available for spatial and bodily awareness practice.
Skills: Comparison, hypothesis, experimentation, problem solving, turn-taking, cause and effect, creativity, observation and prediction

Outside
Materials: Balls, basketball hoop or soccer goals, trucks, shovels, rakes, buckets, trucks, tricycles, scooter cars, sandbox filled with water and flotation toys such as boats.
Rationale: To allow children to explore varied levels of fine and gross motor skills, depending on their preference. Allow children to explore properties of water and float/sink comparisons.
Skill: Fine and gross motor skills, turn taking, problem solving, collaboration, experimentation, balance, coordination, scientific thinking skills.

Materials: Gardening shovels, rakes, gloves, fence building materials (i.e., sticks and string), bulbs, seeds, and watering cans.
Rationale: To provide the children with the option of exploring the gardening process using real gardening tools along with preparing the garden and planting. To allow the children to continue to practice care taking of plants outside of our classroom. To encourage responsibility and observation skills
Skills: Fine motor skills, exploration, turn taking, problem solving, collaboration, and experimentation.

Math and Manipulatives

Materials: Puzzles of a boat, the alphabet and different colored circles. Rationale: To encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination, adaptive fine motor control and connections to other areas in the classroom.

Materials: A winding ramp and cars that roll down on their own once released. Rationale: To promote cause and effect relationships, a fine motor grasp and predictions as well as counting.

Materials: Wooden 'donuts' on a spool of increasing size. Rationale: To promote seriation and sorting by size, to encourage part-whole relationships and step-wise processes.

Materials: "Snap shapes" (wooden blocks with snaps attached for assembly in an open ended way) Rationale: To promote fine motor development, part-whole relationships, and creativity through an interesting medium

Language and Literacy

Materials: Books about curriculum areas (springtime, insects, animals, cities etc) as well as an alphabet puzzle.
Rationale: To allow children to make connections between what they're reading and the classroom or home. To explore books as media for researching topics of interest. To support the development of book and print concepts such as page-turning and holding it correctly. To suport familiarity with first letters of names in the classroom.
Skills: Concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information, using books as inspiration for play or visual representation

Blocks

Materials: Wooden unit blocks, "city" blocks, wooden trees, blue fabric (for water), small wooden cars, small wooden rectangle blocks, plastic tools and toolboxes
Rationale: To allow children to elaborate their pervasive interest of building cities and driving cars, and repairing other areas of the classroom as needed.
Skills: Role playing, collaboration, team work, imaginative play, hand-eye coordination, part-whole relationships, symbolic representation, balance, story telling

Large Motor

Materials: Bolsters, green mats, assembled to create "mat mountain." Skills: Upper and lower body strength, climbing skills, tumbling, body control, risk taking, turn taking
Materials: A-frame climbing structure, blue foam donut. Skills: Risk taking, hand-eye coordination, jumping and landing, upper body strength, turn taking.

Materials: Blue stairs, foam roller slide. Skills: Stair climbing, coordination, risk taking, core strength.

Materials: Climbing wall. Skills: Hand-eye coordination, upper and lower body strength, stamina, risk taking, jumping and landing.

Materials: Monkey bars, basketball hoop, foam balls. Skills: Throwing and catching, turn taking, accuracy, hand-eye coordination.

Materials: Painted hopscotch track. Skills: Number sense, counting, one-to-one correspondence, coordination, balance, jumping.
Rationale for all: To create opportunities for age-appropriate risk taking with the support of teachers as well as to promote large motor skills and body awareness.

Dramatic Play
Materials: Scarves, full length mirrors, instruments (see below), curtains, playbills (created by students), and the loft as a stage.
Rationale: To foster children's natural interest in performance in music and theater, to create a safe opportunity for children to perform in front of others and practice taking leadership roles
Skills: Speaking in front of others, creative thinking, turn-taking, social skills, creative expression and social skills

Music/Movement
Materials: Piano, drums, xylophone, jingle bells, rainsticks, sandpaper blocks, bells, small scarves
Rationale: To promote pitch and rhythm development. To engage in social musical activities. Explore the cause and effect of noises from a musical instrument. Engage in physical movement in time to music, using the scarf as a prop. Engage in performance themed activities to practice social behaviors.
Skill: Fine motor, hand-eye coordination, pitch and rhythm, awareness of others, cause and effect, imitation

Kayla Lead Teaching

Overview

The warm weather is finally here! We will be taking full advantage of this and going outside as much as possible, furthering our curriculum areas. Small groups of children will be going out on bug hunts to bring back bugs to our "Bug Sanctuary" in the classroom where we will be able to make observations. We will be taking a step further with the planting of our two class gardens by planting our vegetable seeds and planting bulbs in the flower garden! The Veterinary Clinic in the dramatic play area will allow children to continue to take care of the sick puppies and kittens, and perhaps zoo animals as well. This week's focus is to expand on the different areas of the classroom, giving the children new and exciting experiences surrounding the curriculum themes already embedded in our environment. Small groups will continue this week--be sure to check out the new documentations and pictures on the website! Don't forget about the all school pizza party on Tuesday, May 24th. Hope you all can make it!

Large Group


This week our large groups will continue to place a focus on the caretaking of animals and tie that in with our new dramatic play area with the veterinary clinic in our loft and zoo area. We will also introduce the concept of bugs, where they live, and what they eat. Felt board stories, movement, dramatic play, poetry, songs, and books will all be used during large group this week. 



Expressive Arts

**Materials: face paint, mirror, brushes. Rationale: To introduce the children to a new sensory experience, while practicing fine motor skills. To allow the children to creatively express themselves through an art experience. To engage in a social art experience. Skills: creative expression, fine motor, hand-eye coordination, social interaction

Sensory

**Materials: Play dough, spices to add, animal cookie cutters, rolling pins, and letter cookie cutters Rationale: To allow the children to explore a new sensory experience with play dough. To encourage children to manipulate the play dough to work on fine motor skills. To continue to facilitate letter recognition. Skills: Fine motor, comparison, communication, problem solving, creative expression, social interaction, symbolic representation.



**Materials: water table, large containers with colored water (red, blue, yellow), basters, small ice cube trays, cups for pouring and mixing the colored water, sink and float materials. Rationale: To allow children to experiment with colors by making their own colors with the colored water. To introduce the children to the sink and float concept and encourage them to think about why some materials float in water and why some sink in water. Skills: cooperative skills, collaboration, experimentation, turn-taking, communication and fine motor skills.



Science

**Materials: Aquarium with butterflies, bugs from our playground, replica toy bugs, magnifying glasses, observation log, pictures of bugs found around lab school, books about bugs. Rationale: To give children the opportunity to explore and observe our butterflies and other bugs around the lab school. Skills: Observation, social interaction, creative expression, comparison, hypothesis, experimentation, problem solving, and turn-taking.

**Materials: Our pet turtles (Tuck and Rainbow), their tank, water changing materials, turtle food, and a cardboard box. Rationale: To build the children's caretaking awareness, we will clean the tank as a class and take the turtles out of their habitat. The children will be able to explore the turtles (with caution) and observe them moving around the cardboard box. Children will be able to get a hands-on experience of changing the water and cleaning the tank. Children will also be able to help with the feeding of the turtles on a weekly basis. Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness of the process of caretaking of pets and animals.

Dramatic Play

**Materials: Doctor dress-up clothes, small doctor carrying bags, various tools for examining the animals, animal feeding dishes, small animal carriers, dog and cat stuffed animals, x-ray pictures of animals, stethoscopes, prescription pill bottles, and ace bandages. Rationale: To build off our curriculum theme of animal caretaking. Encourage the children to engage in social interaction while engaging in a dramatic play story. Skills: collaboration, turn taking, social skills, creative expression, communication, role play, and problem solving.

**Materials: various plastic zoo animals (buffalo, moose, zebra, giraffes, monkeys, polar bears, penguins, lions, and tigers), animal dress up clothes, small and large building blocks to make habitats for the animals, cash registers, zoo entrance tickets, small bottle caps to act as feeding dishes for the animals, hay for food, fake foliage for habitats and rocks. Rationale: To bring our experiences at the zoo to life by allowing the children to create a zoo-like environment using blocks and various zoo animals and habitat materials. To give the children experiences with animals they may have not seen or been exposed to before. Skills: interpretation skills, social skills, creative expression, communication, role play, turn-taking, and fine motor skills
.

Outside

**Materials: gardening shovels, rakes, gloves, fence building materials (i.e., sticks and string), bulbs, seeds, and watering cans. Rationale: To provide the children with the option of exploring the gardening process using real gardening tools along with preparing the garden and planting. To allow the children to continue to practice care taking of plants outside of our classroom. To encourage responsibility and observation skills. Skills: Fine motor skills, exploration, turn taking, problem solving, collaboration, and experimentation.

**Materials: Balls, basketball hoop or soccer goals, trucks, shovels, rakes, buckets, trucks, tricycles or scooter cars. Rationale: To continue to allow children to explore varied levels of fine motor skills, gross motor skills, and ballistic skills. Skills: fine and gross motor skills, ballistic skills, turn taking, problem solving, collaboration, balance, and coordination. 


Math and Manipulatives

**Materials: Puzzles featuring bugs, animals, vehicles. Rationale: To encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination, and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes of bugs and cars.

**Materials: shape seriation puzzle. Rationale: To promote one-to-one correspondence, matching shapes with corresponding whole, counting, seriation, problem solving.

**Materials: "Snap shapes" Rationale: To promote fine motor development, part-whole relationships, and creativity through an interesting medium.

**Materials: Foot and hand diagrams (descending from smallest to largest), measuring tapes, and paper. Rationale: To encourage the children to compare and contrast size while recognizing different parts of the body. Skills: Comparison, collaboration, turn-taking, and problem solving.

Language and Literacy


**Materials: books about bugs, butterflies, animal caretaking occupations, zoo animals, transportation, babies, and other curriculum-inspired topics Rationale: To help children to make connections between what they're reading and the classroom or home. To explore various curriculum topics in a way which prompts the children to ask questions and express their interest surrounding the curriculum areas. Skills: Concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information, using books as inspiration for play or visual representation, fine motor, social interaction, making predictions



**Materials: Question of the day, white board, dry erase markers Rationale: To encourage children to begin practicing writing and letter recognition. Skills: pre-writing, translating thoughts into recorded form, organizing thoughts into symbols, recognition of symbols.

Blocks


**Materials: small wooden cars, medium wooden cars, boats, cardboard boxes, nuts and bolts to "fix" the cars, cardboard wheels, steering wheels, pictures of different types of cars and boats, bridge pictures, and large plank blocks to build roads. Rationale: To expand on the children's growing interest of building cars. To give the children the experience of building cars as well as fixing cars. The children can pretend to drive to any destination they would like while in their car. To promote building and interpretation of things they see in the real world and bringing it into classroom. Skills: gross and fine motor skills, social interaction, role playing, collaboration, team work, imaginative play, hand-eye coordination, part-whole relationships, symbolic representation, and balance.

Music:
**Materials: drums, shakers, xylophone, scarves, and CD player. Rationale: To promote pitch and rhythm development. To engage in social musical activities. To explore the cause and effect of musical instruments. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, pitch and rhythm, awareness of each other.

Large Motor (gym)

**Materials: bolsters, green mats, assembled to create "mat mountain." Skills: Upper and lower body strength, climbing skills, tumbling, body control, risk taking, turn taking.


Materials: A-frame climbing structure, blue foam donut. Skills: Risk taking, hand-eye coordination, jumping and landing, upper body strength, turn taking.


Materials: Blue stairs, foam roller slide. Skills: Stair climbing, coordination, risk taking, core strength.


Materials: Climbing wall. Skills: Hand-eye coordination, upper and lower body strength, stamina, risk taking, jumping and landing.


Materials: Monkey bars, basketball hoop, foam balls. Skills: Throwing and catching, turn taking, accuracy, hand-eye coordination.


Materials: Painted hopscotch track. Skills: Number sense, counting, one-to-one correspondence, coordination, balance, jumping.

Snack
Tuesday: Oranges & Graham Crackers
Friday: Alphabet Soup & Oyster Crackers

Andrea Lead Teaching

Overview

This week's focus is to expand on the different areas of the classroom giving the children new and exciting experiences surrounding the curriculum themes already imbedded in our environment. Spring has sprung throughout our classroom and the children have had the experience of planting seeds indoors as well as exploring plants, seeds, and roots. This week we will be taking that a step further and will be planting two class gardens outside! The caretaking of animals has been a reoccurring theme and interest of the children, so to expand on that we have added an Animal Hospital to the dramatic play area where the children can care for their sick animals. This connects nicely with the Zoo area as well. We will continue to try to take small groups outside to do further exploration of our natural environment as well as fostering budding relationships or strengthening existing ones. We expect our caterpillars to emerge as butterflies sometime this week as well.

Large Group

This week our large groups will focus on the visit of Julianna's dog. We will also continue to focus on the caretaking of animals and tie that in with our new dramatic play area; The Animal Hospital. Felt board stories, movement, dramatic play, poetry, songs, and book reading will all be used during large group this week.

Expressive Arts

Materials: small cardboard pieces, wood blocks, bottle caps, fabric squares, and other various materials the children can use to "build up" and create a 3D sculpture. Rationale: To help children use creative expression and fine motor skills while creating a 3D art project. To engage in a social art experience over a period of time. Skills: creative expression, fine motor, hand-eye coordination, social interaction, symbolic representation

Sensory
Materials: Glurch and tools to manipulate it: hammers with textured ends, textured roller pins, cookie cutter letters, and other various playdoh tools. Rationale: To allow the children to explore a different sensory experience than they might be used to. To encourage children who don't often use play dough to come to this area and explore the different experience of using glurch verses playdoh. Skills: Fine motor, comparison, communication, problem solving, creative expression, social interaction, symbolic representation.

Water Table:
Materials: plastic baby dolls, empty shampoo and conditioner bottles, loofahs, baby bath, and cups for pouring over the babies' heads, rubber duckies, larger cups for pouring. Rationale: To encourage children to practice an authentic skill of washing babies by allowing them to experience it at the water table. Many children have (new) younger siblings at home, so this allows for connections between home and school. Skills: cooperative skills, collaboration, turn-taking, role-playing, communication and fine motor.

Science
Materials: flashlights, mirrors, other interesting and shiny surfaces, cellophane, and rubber bands Rationale: To give children the opportunity to explore light and shadow in the darkness of the cave. To provide the children with the experience of seeing how light reflects off different colored objects. Skills: social interaction, creative expression, comparison, hypothesis, experimentation, problem solving, turn-taking, cause and effect, and observing

Materials: both faux and real bird's nests, eggs, tree stumps, model birds, books about birds, feathers, and magnifying glasses. Rationale: To build on the children's interest in birds and their habitat. To provide the children with the experience of seeing a bird's habitat so they are able to connect that to their experience of making bird feeders. Skills: creativity, hypothesis, communication, comparison

Dramatic Play
Materials: Doctor dress up clothes, small doctor carrying bags, various tools for examining the animals, animal feeding dishes, small animal carriers, small stuffed animals, x-ray pictures of animals, stethoscopes, prescription pill bottles. Rationale: To build off our curriculum theme of animal caretaking. Encourage the children to engage in social interaction while engaging in a dramatic play story. Skills: collaboration, turn taking, social skills, creative expression, communication, role play, problem solving

Materials: various plastic zoo animals, animal dress up clothes, building blocks to make habitats for the animals, cash registers, zoo entrance tickets, small bottle caps to act as feeding dishes for the animals. Rationale: To allow the children to explore a zoo-like environment as well as various zoo animals before taking our field trip. To give the children experiences with animals they may have not seen or been exposed to before. Skills: social skills, creative expression, communication, role play, turn-taking, fine motor skills

Outside
Materials: gardening tools, fence building materials (i.e. sticks and string), balls, basketball hoop or soccer goals, trucks, shovels, rakes, buckets, trucks, tricycles or scooter cars. Rationale: Allow children to explore varied levels of fine and gross motor skills, depending on their preference. To provide the children with the option of exploring the gardening process using real gardening tools along with preparing the garden and planting. Skill: fine and gross motor skills, turn taking, problem solving, collaboration, experimentation, balance, coordination

Math and Manipulatives
Materials: Puzzles of zoo animals, momma-baby animals and other varied creatures Rationale: To encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination, and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes of animals and babies.

Materials: wooden box with different shaped holes in it and corresponding pieces that fit through. Rationale: To promote one-to-one correspondence, matching flat shapes with a 3D object, counting, problem solving.

Materials: peg puzzle with colored pieces that stack 1-5 on their own peg. Rationale: counting with meaning, recognition of number groupings, color sorting

Materials: Small wooden cubes Rationale: To provide an open-ended block building activity with a fine motor focus.

Materials: Adult-baby matching puzzle. Rationale: To practice matching and explore the concept of animal babies

Language and Literacy

Materials: books about springtime, butterflies, animal caretaking occupations, zoo animals, cars, babies, birds, shadows and other curriculum-inspired topics Rationale: To allow children to make connections between what they're reading and the classroom or home. To explore various curriculum topics in a way which prompts the children to ask questions and express their interest surrounding the curriculum areas. Skills: Concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information, using books as inspiration for play or visual representation, fine motor, social interaction, making predictions

Blocks

Materials: small wooden cars, medium wood cars, cardboard boxes, nuts and bolts to "fix" the cars, cardboard wheels, "seatbelts", steering wheels, "horns", pictures of different types of cars, large plank blocks to build roads. Rationale: To expand on the children's growing interest of building cars. To provide the children with the opportunity to ride in a "real" car. To give the children the experience of building cars as well as fixing cars. The children can pretend to drive to any destination they would like while in their car. Skills: gross and fine motor skills, social interaction, role playing, collaboration, team work, imaginative play, hand-eye coordination, part-whole relationships, symbolic representation, balance, story telling

Large Motor (gym)
Materials: A-frame jump into donut , tumbling hill, bumpy slide, basketball, hopscotch, Skills: static balance (twisting, bending, stretching), coordination, core strength, imaginative play, hopping, rolling and tumbling, running down an incline

Julianna Lead Teaching

Overview
Spring is continuous both inside and outside of our classroom. To elaborate on an initial interest in birds and turtles and their needs from previous weeks, we are introducing zoo materials in the loft dramatic play space. This will allow children to continue to explore what animals eat, where they live and other lifestyle patterns. We will also be using a bird feeder outside of our classroom window to continue observations of birds eating. The water table has also seen a revamp based on children's interest: the water table is now a fully functional baby-washing station. This allows children to role play as they learn how to care for babies during bath time using soap, loofahs and a baby sized-bath. To continue with the always-popular theme of construction, we are moving toward a focus of riding in cars by creating opportunities for children to "build" cars with blocks, wear seatbelts and drive with a steering wheel. They can even take a trip to the zoo! Provided the weather cooperates, more small-group style walks out of the classroom to look for worms, signs of spring, animals and other interests of the children will continue to happen. This gives children a smaller setting in which to bond with other children and take on a leadership position in a more comfortable way.

Large Group

This week our large groups will focus on babies and caregiving. We will reflect on Ayuko's visit this past Friday by reading stories about babies. Some letter writing will occur to reflect on a past theme of the post office and to give children opportunities to practice fine motor skills in a group setting. Movement, poetry, songs, book reading and fingerplays will all be used during large group this week.

Expressive Arts

Materials: different colored paint and brushes to paint the already-produced collage with natural materials from last week. Rationale: To help children use color as expression and practice painting a 3-D object. To work on a project over a few days, so that the children will be able to see their creation as a process, and then to display the final product to beautify our classroom. To engage in a social art experience over a period of time. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, creative expression, awareness of self and others.

Sensory
Materials: Glurch and tools to manipulate it: cookie cutters and rotary cutters early in the week, adding and switching out tools later in the week.
Rationale: To encourage children to compare and contrast this with the play dough, to invite scientific inquiry and exploration of the mysterious properties of glurch. Switching play dough for glurch also may encourage children who don't often use play dough to come to this area.
Skills: Fine motor, comparison, hypothesis, communication, problem solving, symbolic representation, and trial and error.

Water Table:
Materials: plastic baby dolls, empty shampoo and conditioner bottles, loofahs, baby bath and cups for pouring over the babies' heads.
Rationale: This encourages children to practice an authentic skill of washing babies by allowing them to experience it at the water table. Many children have (new) younger siblings at home, so this allows for connections between home and school. Likewise the delicate operation of hair washing they experience may also be experienced from another viewpoint. Skills: cooperative skills, collaboration, turn-taking, role-playing, communication and fine motor.

Science
Materials: flashlights, mirrors, other interesting and shiny surfaces, cellophane and rubber bands
Rationale: Give children the opportunity to explore light and shadow in the darkness of the cave. Allow for the continued interest in colored cellophane from last week's cave theme to carry over here as they project colored light from their flashlights.
Skills: comparison, hypothesis, experimentation, problem solving, turn-taking, cause and effect, and observing

Outside
Materials: balls, basketball hoop or soccer goals, trucks, shovels, rakes, buckets, trucks, tricycles or scooter cars.
Rationale: Allow children to explore varied levels of fine and gross motor skills, depending on their preference.
Skill: fine and gross motor skills, turn taking, problem solving, collaboration, experimentation, balance, coordination

Math and Manipulatives

Materials: Puzzles of flowers, tools, birds and a frog. Rationale: To encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination, and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes.

Materials: Sorting/seriation/counting blocks. Rationale: To promote one-to-one correspondence, counting with meaning, recognition of number groupings (three and four objects in a group).

Materials: Small building logs. Rationale: To provide an open-ended block building activity with a fine motor focus.

Materials: Adult-baby matching puzzle. Rationale: To practice matching and explore the concept of animal babies

Language and Literacy

Materials: books about springtime, zoo animals, cars, babies, birds, shadows and other curriculum-inspired topics
Rationale: To allow children to make connections between what they're reading and the classroom or home. To explore books as media for researching topics of interest. To support the development of book and print concepts such as page-turning and holding it correctly.
Skills: Concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information, using books as inspiration for play or visual representation

Blocks

Materials: model trucks, "seatbelts", steering wheels, "horns," pictures of different types of cars
Rationale: Allow children to elaborate on their interest in riding in a car. They can go to pretend destinations while driving and build their own car.
Skills: role playing, collaboration, team work, imaginative play, hand-eye coordination, part-whole relationships, symbolic representation, balance, story telling

Large Motor

Materials: A-frame, "rope maze." Skills: static balance (twisting, bending, stretching), coordination, core strength, imaginative play

Materials: stairs, foam triangle and blue donut, platform, foam roller slide. Skills: upper and lower body strength, coordination, stability and balance, risk taking, turn taking

Materials: stairs, bolsters, inverted monkey bars with swinging bridge. Skills: balance, coordination, stability, risk taking, core strength, turn taking

Music/Movement
Materials: piano, drums, xylophone, finger cymbals, sandpaper blocks, bells, small scarves
Rationale: To promote pitch and rhythm development. To engage in social musical activities. To explore the cause and effect of noises from a musical instrument.To engage in physical movement in time to music, using a scarf as a prop
Skill: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, pitch and rhythm, awareness of others, cause and effect, imitation

Snacks:
Tuesday - Trail Mix
Friday - Fruit and Cracker

Kayla Lead Teaching

Overview:
 This week's focus is on the care giving and appreciation of living things. Babies, animals and plants are going to be a huge part of our lesson plan. We will be adding babies to our home living area in order to make a connection to the children's homes while they are at school. So many of our children have had new and exciting additions to their families. We are going to continue to explore the wonders of spring while utilizing the beautiful weather by taking small group nature walks on a regular basis and recording and documenting what we observe paying close attention to the animals and plants that are living near the lab school. In addition, we will take small groups out of the playground area to observe the construction going on outside the lab school. We will be observing our bird feeders hanging from the window of our classroom. We will be looking at the birds and animals that are using our feeders and observe the ways that the animals eat. We will weave literacy and creativity into these various curriculum topics by bringing in books relating to our various curriculum areas, writing letters during large groups to important people in our lives, and practicing writing names and letters. Andrea will be cooking with the children on Monday making English muffin pizzas.

Expressive Arts


**Materials: different textured wallpaper, glue, buttons, pipe cleaners, plastic caps, bottle caps, and paint. Rationale: To let the children express their imagination to create a spring inspired collage. To work on a project over a few days, so that the children will be able to see their creation as a process then to display the final product in our class. To draw the children's attention to the ways in which nature changes to spring and to let the children express their interpretation of spring through the collage. To engage in a social art experience over a period of time. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, creative expression, awareness of self and others.

**Materials: light box, artificial petals, stems, roots (parts of a flower/plant), books about plants/growing and felt board with the process of planting and growing of plants. Rationale: To promote creative expression and to reinforce the thinking through a new media. To explore plant and their growth. Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, symbolic representation, turn taking, new vocabulary words

Sensory

**Materials: Letters cut-outs, playdoh, rolling pins, cookie cutters, and various playdoh tools. Rationale: To encourage experimentation with color mixing, we will be making the playdoh a variety of colors. Skills: making connections, communication, turn taking, trial and error, problem-solving, symbolic representation, creative expression

**Materials: water, different species of turtles (toy replicas), small, medium, and large rocks, aquarium rocks, small fish (toy replicas), insects (toy replicas), tubes, nets, funnels, fish and turtle food and artificial plants. Rationale: To promote awareness of nature and the habitat of animals in our classroom and in the world. To enhance observation and perception skills through exploring turtles' habitat. To promote experimentation and problem solving around moving water from the water table into the funnels and tubes. Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, observation, collaboration, expanding vocabulary (Species of turtles)
Science

**Materials: our pet turtles (Tuck and Rainbow), their tank, water changing materials, turtle food, and a cardboard box. Rationale: To build the children's caretaking awareness we will clean the tank as a class and take the turtles out of their habitat. The children will be able to explore the turtles (with caution) and observe them moving around the cardboard box. Children will be able to get hands on experience of changing the water and cleaning the tank. Children will also be able to help with the feeding of the turtles on a weekly basis. Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness of the process of caretaking of pets and animals.

**Materials: Bird feeders, "observation log," photos of different species of birds that we might see (around window), green stairs for viewing the feeders. Rationale: In order to extend the bird feeder activity we did last week we will observe the feeders over the week to see what kind of animals are using the birdfeeders. To encourage observation of the birds and other animals eating the seeds off of the birdfeeders to made last week. To continue to promote recording of comments and observations. To explore making hypotheses and predictions. Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness of how and what birds eat.

**Materials: seeds, plant cuttings, avocado seeds, bulbs, various clear containers full of water, magnifying glasses, "observation log". Rationale: To give children the opportunity to witness the sprouting of a seed and build awareness of the individual parts of plants. Skills: observation, exploration, communication, recording, responsibility, hypothesis, new vocabulary words.

**Materials: seeds, clear plastic bags, paper towels Rationale: To move the children's interests from exploring the plants. By having each child have an opportunity to have their own bag with a seed to watch germination process. Children will be able to observe the germination of the seed and then record the observations with assistance of a teacher. Skills: observation, explorations, communication, recording, hypothesis.

Outside/Science

**Materials: gardener's gloves, trowels, small shovels, watering cans, plant seeds. Rationale: To explore what it means to be a gardener outside of the classroom by taking care of live vegetation (or pretending to). Small groups could go out together and role-play the planting process on the playgroup during large group. Skills: hypothesis, communication, exploration, creative expression, symbolic representation, turn taking, observation, role-play, cause and effect

**Materials: camera, clipboard and pen. Rationale: We will continue take small group nature walks to explore nature and to get a better understanding of the different signs of spring. Also, we will observe the construction that is going on around the lab school. To promote an awareness of nature and seasons. Skills: observation, hypothesis and predictions, recording, exploration and communication.

Dramatic Play


**Materials: Babies, cribs, high chairs, baby clothing, baby bottles, formula, and rattles. Rationale: To begin to introduce babies to the children because of the new additions that many families have had or are having in the near future. Children will get a chance to live out their experiences at school and relate them to home. Skills: social skills, cooperative skills, collaboration, creative expression, and role-play.

**Materials: construction hats, dump trucks, cement trucks, hammer and nail replica toys, tool carrier, toy replica hammers, screw drivers, wrenches and saws, slide show of machines and how they work, pictures of bridges and other structural buildings. Rationale: To expand on a growing number of children's interests in "fixing" things and construction. To bring outside experiences with seeing various construction trucks or construction jobs going on in the community into the classroom and to explore how construction (and "fixing" things) works. Skills: creative expression, communication, role play, collaboration, problem solving

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Puzzles of flowers, tools, birds and a frog. Rationale: To encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination, and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes.

**Materials: Sorting/seriation/counting blocks. Rationale: To promote one-to-one correspondence, counting with meaning, recognition of number groupings (three and four objects in a group).

**Materials: Small logs. Rationale: To provide an open-ended block building activity with a fine motor focus.

Language and Literacy

**Materials: paper, envelopes, and pens. Rationale: To order to bring closure to the delivery area, we will create letters as a large group to someone or something important to mail or deliver our letters to that special someone/something. To explore the process of recording information and thoughts. To begin to recognize symbols and print as conveying meaning. To continue to work on fundamentals of writing. Skills: pre-writing, translating thoughts into recorded form, organizing thoughts into symbols, recognition of symbols.

**Materials: books relating to construction, spring, plants, turtles and birds, babies, and transportation of goods. Rationale: To explore books as media for researching topics of interest. To support the development of book and print concepts. Skills: concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information.
Blocks



**Materials: Blocks, steering wheels, symbolic hubcaps, garbage trucks and recycling trucks, cement trucks, tubes and bottle caps as cargo, and road signs. Rationale: To expand off the children's growing interest of vehicle we will encourage the children to use their imagine to build their own vehicles and machines with the building materials. To practice hand-eye coordination and part-whole relationships while creating roads, bridges, and other structures. Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation, balance, coordination, cause and effect I will probably add something about small group visits to the building blocks in the gym.

Large Motor

**Materials: climbing ladders, monkey bars, foam roller slide with rope, climber with donut slide, climbing bars with slanted plank bridge in between. Rationale: To provide more climbing challenges along with opportunities for risk taking. The foam roller slide provides a new challenge of using upper body strength to pull up and risk taking to slide down. The plank bridge challenges the children to use balance in order to walk from one end to the other. Skills: climbing, upper and lower body strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, depth perception, and physical risk taking.

Large Group


This week, our large groups will involve books, songs, and fingerplays relating to plants, animals, babies, and construction. We will read social stories, sing new songs, and model new activities in the room, such as caring for a baby (changing a diaper).
Music/Movement



**Materials: songs brought in by families, piano, drums, xylophone, finger cymbals. Rationale: To promote pitch and rhythm development. To engage in social musical activities. To explore the cause and effect of musical instruments. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, pitch and rhythm, awareness of each other.

Snack:
Tuesday - Animal crackers & milk
Friday- Crackers & fruit

Andrea Beebe Lead Teaching

Overview

Our goals this week are to build on the new areas that were added to the classroom last week (delivery area, plant area and turtle/animal caretaking area). We also are going to dive deeper into exploring the wonders of spring life while utilizing the hopefully beautiful weather by taking small group nature walks on a regular basis and recording/documenting what we observe. To expand on the interest of spring animals/spring theme further, we will be doing a cooking project creating bird feeders with sun butter (no peanuts) and hanging them outside our classroom windows so the children are able to observe them while in the classroom. Our goal is to also weave literacy and creativity into these various curriculum topics by adding books throughout the classroom relating to our various curriculum areas, maps in the delivery and block area, along with computer paper in the delivery area for the children to practice writing their name or writing letters in general. We will also be starting our small groups this week!

Expressive Arts

**Materials: one of the large tree branches hanging in our classroom, green ribbon, green tissue paper, green cellophane, glue, other green materials that we are able to add to the tree branch to make it more "spring like". Rationale: To bring the interest of the seasons change in to the classroom. To draw the children's attention to the ways in which nature changes from winter to spring. To engage in a social art experience. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, creative expression, awareness of self and others.

**Materials: light box, artificial petals, stems, roots (parts of a flower/plant), books about plants/growing. Rationale: To promote creative expression and begin the process of thinking about plants and growth. Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, symbolic representation, turn taking, new vocabulary words

Sensory

**Materials: hard plastic shapes that leave leaf and flower like impressions on the playdoh, playdough, rolling pins, cookie cutters, and various playdoh tools. Rationale: To encourage children to think about springtime and growth in an unexpected area in the classroom via plant impressions on the dough. We will also be making the playdoh a variety of colors to encourage color mixing. Skills: making connections, communication, turn taking, trial and error (what amount of dough works for the best impression), problem-solving, symbolic representation, creative expression

**Materials: water, different species of turtles (toy replicas), small medium and large rocks, aquarium rocks, small fish (toy replicas), tubes, nets, funnels, and artificial plants. Rationale: To promote awareness of nature and the habitat of animals in our classroom and world. To enhance observation and perception skills through exploring turtles' habitat. To promote experimentation and problem solving around creating fountains with tubes and funnels. Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, observation, collaboration, expanding vocabulary (Species of turtles)

Science

**Materials: Pinecones, sunbutter (peanut free), bird seed, string, log record of the kinds of birds coming to the bird feeders. Rationale: To promote exploration of the world around us and to observe the birds eating from the feeders near the lab school. To continue to promote recording of comments and observations. To explore making hypotheses and predictions. Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness of how and what birds eat.

**Materials: seeds, plant cuttings, various clear containers full of water, "observation log". Rationale: To give children the opportunity to witness the sprouting of a seed and build awareness of the individual parts of plants. Skills: observation, exploration, communication, recording, responsibility, hypothesis, new vocabulary words.
Outside/Science

**Materials: gardener's gloves, trowels, small shovels, watering cans, plant seeds. Rationale: To explore what it means to be a gardener outside of the classroom by taking care of live vegetation (or pretending to). Skills: hypothesis, communication, exploration, creative expression, symbolic representation, turn taking, observation, role-play, cause and effect

**Materials: camera, clipboard and pen. Rationale: Small group nature walks to explore nature and to get a better understanding of the different signs in our world that mean spring is coming. To promote an awareness of nature and seasons. Skills: observation, hypothesis and predictions, recording, exploration and communication.

Dramatic Play

**Materials: mail carrier dress up, packages, scales to weigh the various packages, computer paper folded into a tri-fold, newspapers, recycled computer paper, books about mail and delivery jobs, clipboards to map out route, steering wheels, and postage. Rationale: To begin to explore a specific delivery jobs in response to the interest in the garbage and recycling trucks in the block area and the recent delivery by the FedEx truck on the playground. Using simple maps to draw and "plan out" a route for delivering the mail. Skills: Pre-reading and writing, collaboration, creative expression, role-play
Along with the delivery theme, we have also added a construction area to the dramatic play center. Materials: construction hats, construction themed picture slideshow on the computer, dump trucks, hammer and nail replica toys, tool carrier, toy replica hammers, screw drivers, wrenches and saws. Rationale: To expand on a growing number of children's interests in "fixing" things and construction. To bring outside experiences with seeing various construction trucks or construction jobs going on in the community into the classroom and exploring how construction (and "fixing" things) works. Skills: creative expression, communication, role play, collaboration, problem solving

Math and Manipulatives

**Materials: balancing scales, packages (various weights of packages) Rationale: To expand on children's interest in heavy vs. light as well as big, bigger, biggest and small, smaller, smallest. To introduce scales and how to read them to explain various math concepts (i.e., this package is heavier than this one) Skills: sorting, classification, comparison, weight

**Materials: Puzzles of delivery trucks/construction themed trucks, tools, pet animals and a frog. Rationale: To encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination, and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes.
**Materials: Sorting/seriation/counting blocks. Rationale: To promote one-to-one correspondence, counting with meaning, recognition of number groupings (three and four objects in a group).
**Materials: Small logs. Rationale: To provide an open-ended block building activity with a fine motor focus.
**Materials: Fraction puzzle. Rationale: To explore the concepts of whole, half, thirds, and fourths.

Language and Literacy

**Materials: shipping "invoices," clipboards, pens. Recycling and mail related symbols, and computer paper with writing utensils in the delivery area. Recording implements for scientific observations. Rationale: To bring awareness to the process of recording information and thoughts. To begin to recognize symbols and print as conveying meaning. To continue to work on fundamentals of writing. Skills: pre-writing, translating thoughts into recorded form, organizing thoughts into symbols, recognition of symbols.

**Materials: books relating to construction, spring, delivery, plants, turtles and other animals, babies, and transportation of goods. Rationale: To explore books as media for researching topics of interest. To support the development of book and print concepts. Skills: concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information.

Blocks

**Materials: Blocks, garbage trucks, recycling trucks, cement trucks, blue trucks with FedEx symbol, gas pumps, tubes and bottle caps as cargo, road signs, and small symbolic "people" figures. Rationale: To expand off the children's growing interest in the garbage trucks (which were the first trucks placed in the block area) and to introduce other various delivery trucks. To explore symbols and their meaning (i.e. the FedEx symbol, recycling symbol etc.) To practice hand-eye coordination and part-whole relationships while creating roads, bridges, and other structures. Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation, balance, coordination, cause and effect

Large Motor

**Materials: climbing ladders, monkey bars, foam roller slide with rope, climber with donut slide, climbing bars with slanted plank bridge in between. Rationale: To provide more climbing challenges along with opportunities for risk taking. The foam roller slide provides a new challenge of using upper body strength to pull up and risk taking to slide down. The plank bridge challenges the children to use balance in order to walk from one end to the other. Skills: climbing, upper and lower body strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, depth perception, physical risk taking.

Large Group

This week, our large groups will involve books, songs, and fingerplays relating to plants, animals, delivery, and construction. We will read social stories, sing new songs, and model new activities in the room, such as the new branch decorating art activity in the art area or the delivery dramatic play.

Music/Movement

**Materials: songs brought in by families, drums, xylophone, finger cymbals. Rationale: To promote pitch and rhythm development. To engage in social musical activities. To explore the cause and effect of musical instruments. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, pitch and rhythm, awareness of each other.

Snacks:

Tuesday - Pretzels & milk

Friday- Cucumber slices & crackers

Student Teachers Co-Lead Teaching

Overview

Our goals this week are to build on some unexpected "rich moments" which occurred last week (the delivery of a package from the Fed Ex truck and the sighting of wild turkeys in our playground), focusing on extensions of this material. We also hope to begin exploring the magic of new life sprouting by studying plants and the growth process.

Expressive Arts

**Materials: butcher paper, markers and crayons, large stencils. Rationale: To practice fine motor skill of following an outline. To engage in a social art experience. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, writing grasp, creative expression, awareness of self and others.

Cave
**Materials: light box, artificial petals, stems, roots (parts of a flower/plant), books about plants/growing. Rationale: To promote creative expression and begin the process of thinking about plants and growth. Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, symbolic representation, turn taking, new vocabulary words

Sensory

**Materials: hard plastic shapes that leave leaf and flower like impressions on the playdough, playdough, rolling pins, cookie cutters, and various playdough tools. Rationale: To encourage children to think about springtime and growth in an unexpected area in the classroom via plant impressions on the dough. Skills: making connections, communication, turn taking, trial and error (what amount of dough works for the best impression), problem-solving, symbolic representation

**Materials: water, different species of turtles (toy replicas), rocks, and artificial plants. Rationale: To promote awareness of nature and the habitat of animals in our classroom and world. To enhance observation and perception skills through exploring turtles' habitat. Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, observation, collaboration, expanding vocabulary (Species of turtles)

Science

**Materials: Pinecones, sunbutter (peanut free), bird seed, string, log record of the kinds of birds coming to the bird feeders. Rationale: To promote exploration of the world around us and to observe the birds eating from the feeders near the lab school. To continue to promote recording of comments and observations. To explore making hypotheses and predictions. Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness of how and what birds eat.

**Materials: seeds, plant cuttings, various clear containers full of water, "observation log." Rationale: To give children the opportunity to witness the sprouting of a seed and build awareness of the individual parts of plants. Skills: observation, exploration, communication, recording, responsibility, hypothesis, new vocabulary words.

Outside/Science
**Materials: gardener's gloves, trowels, small shovels, watering cans, plant seeds. Rationale: To explore what it means to be a gardener outside of the classroom by taking care of live vegetation (or pretending to). Skills: hypothesis, communication, exploration, creative expression, symbolic representation, turn taking, observation, role-play, cause and effect

We will also be going on nature walks to explore the animals that live near the lab school. Last week we saw wild turkeys through the gym windows and on our playground.
**Materials: camera, clipboard and pen. Rationale: To explore nature and to get a better understanding of wild animals. To promote an awareness of nature and animal habitats. Skills: observation, hypothesis and predictions, recording, exploration and communication.

Dramatic Play

**Materials: mail carrier dress up, packages, scales to weigh the various packages, books about mail and delivery jobs, clipboards to map out route, steering wheels, and postage. Rationale: To begin to explore a specific delivery jobs in response to the interest in the garbage and recycling trucks in the block area and the recent delivery by the FedEx truck on the playground. Using simple maps to draw and "plan out" a route for delivering the mail. Skills: Pre-reading and writing, collaboration, creative expression, role-play

Math and Manipulatives

**Materials: balancing scales, packages (various weights of packages) Rationale: To expand on children's interest in heavy vs. light as well as big, bigger, biggest and small, smaller, smallest. To introduce scales and how to read them to explain various math concepts (i.e., this package is heavier than this one) Skills: sorting, classification, comparison, weight

Language and Literacy

**Materials: shipping "invoices," clipboards, pens. Recycling and mail related symbols. Recording implements for scientific observations. Rationale: To bring awareness to the process of recording information and thoughts. To begin to recognize symbols and print as conveying meaning. Skills: pre-writing, translating thoughts into recorded form, organizing thoughts into symbols, recognition of symbols.

**Materials: books relating to construction, spring, plants, turtles and other animals, babies, and transportation of goods. Rationale: To explore books as media for researching topics of interest. To support the development of book and print concepts. Skills: concepts of books and print, using pictures in books to gain information.

Blocks

**Materials: Blocks, garbage trucks, recycling trucks, cement trucks, blue trucks with FedEx symbol, gas pumps, tubes and bottle caps as cargo, small wooden cars, road signs, and small symbolic "people" figures. Rationale: To expand off the growing interest in the garbage trucks and to introduce other various delivery trucks. To explore symbols and their meaning (i.e. the FedEx symbol, recycling symbol etc.) To practice hand-eye coordination and part-whole relationships while creating roads, bridges, and other structures. Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation, balance, coordination, cause and effect

Large Motor

**Materials: climbing ladders, monkey bars, foam roller slide with rope, climber with donut slide, A-frame with ladder bridge. Rationale: To provide more climbing challenges along with opportunities for risk taking. The foam roller slide provides a new challenge of using upper body strength to pull up and risk taking to slide down. Skills: climbing, upper and lower body strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, depth perception, physical risk taking.

Large Group

This week, our large groups will involve books, songs, and fingerplays relating to plants, animals, construction. We will read social stories about recent exciting events, such as the turkeys or the Fed Ex delivery and model new activities in the room, such as the "flower making" activity in the cave or the delivery dramatic play.

Music/Movement

**Materials: songs brought in by families, drums, xylophone, finger cymbals. Rationale: To promote pitch and rhythm development. To engage in social musical activities. To explore the cause and effect of musical instruments. Skills: fine motor, hand-eye coordination, pitch and rhythm, awareness of each other.

Snacks:
Tuesday - Animal crackers & milk
Friday- Pasta & sauce

Overview

As we settle into our routines and get to know each other, we will be able to delve deeper into areas of interest this week. The disappearance of snow on our playground and the revelation of sand, grass, plants, and mud underneath lends itself to small group nature walks to look for other "signs of spring," as well as an exploration of mixing wet and dry substances to make new compounds, which will be explored through cooking and sensory projects. We have begun to notice more construction vehicles and garbage trucks passing our playground on their way to road construction sites, which has led some children to become interested in road construction, cargo transportation, and bridge and tunnel building in the block area.

Expressive Arts

In the art area this week, we will expand our creation of "fire" in the dramatic play area to make smaller fires to carry around the room and hoses to put them out. **Materials: Tubes, fire and water colored ribbon, strips of paper, string, tape, glue, paint.
Rationale: To provide a collaborative art experience. To promote social interaction and creative expression. To practice symbolic representation and dramatic play.
 Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, collaboration, social interaction, symbolic representation, visual-spatial awareness

Sensory

**Materials: play dough, cooking utensils, cut-outs, wet and dry ingredients 
Rationale: To promote the development of fine motor and pre-writing skills through squeezing and grasping dough and utensils. To provide a medium for creative expression.
**Materials: water, large and small containers, large buckets
Rationale: To promote problem solving and cooperation through striving for a common goal (filling a large bucket). To explore pre-math and science skills of cause and effect, conservation of volume, comparison of volume, and properties of liquids. To increase awareness of each other through parallel and cooperative play.
Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, observation, collaboration, shape vocabulary (round container, square container and hexagon container)

Science

**Materials: Variety of magnets of different sizes and strengths, clipboard and pen. 
Rationale: To allow exploration of the distinctive force of magnetism. To continue to promote recording of comments and observations. To explore making hypothesis and predictions. 
Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness that magnets attract on one side but repulse on opposite side. Trial and error (determining which objects connect with magnets and which don't.)

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Fire trucks, fire coats, hats and boots, cell phones, blocks, kitchen, clipboards for drawing maps, firefighting and emergency symbols.
Rationale: To continue to explore the story line of "firefighter." To explore the meaning of symbols through recognizing environmental print (for example, exit sign) and using simple maps to find the "fire" in our classroom. Skills: Pre-reading and writing, collaboration, creative expression, role-play
**Materials: Airplanes, loose parts for runways, small symbolic play characters, garbage trucks, other load bearing trucks. Rationale: To connect the scenarios of airplanes with other cargo trucks. To practice hand-eye coordination and part-whole relationships while creating roads, bridges, and other structures.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation, balance, coordination, cause and effect

Science/Dramatic Play
**Materials: woodland animals, natural materials. Rationale: provide the raw material for exploration of the themes of animal habitats as winter comes to a close. Skills: vocabulary (woodland animals, bears, beavers, hibernation, lair) awareness of change of seasons, storytelling, and creative symbolic representation (cave building materials)

Math and Manipulatives

**Materials: round, square, and long objects in colors of purple, blue, and yellow; sorting box. Rationale: To promote classification and grouping skills by sorting by color and shape. Skills: matching, sorting, color and shape identification.
**Materials: cones labeled 1-4 with numbers and place holders, small wooden blocks to place on the appropriate squares. Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of number correspondence with amount, one to one correspondence, ordering.
**Materials: large and small "pill shaped" tubes Rationale: Fine motor work, sorting and color matching. Skills: shape awareness, classification, fine motor
**Materials: Puzzles of airplanes, woodland animals, birds. Rationale: encourage part-whole thinking, visual discrimination and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes.
**Materials: Seriation Blocks, Skills: seriation, balance.
**Materials: Peg builders. Rationale: provide an early small material construction experience with pegs and boards which are easily connected. Skills: persistence, fine motor, hand strength, motor planning, creativity as well as following model and directions.

Language and Literacy

**Materials: Name cards, Books on spring, wind, magnets, new babies, toileting, alphabet, firefighters, and story books, Environmental print and symbols including emergency symbols and airline logos. 
Rationale: To encourage pre-literacy skills, development of vocabulary relative to classroom theme areas, and create awareness of letters by singing about our names and the letters in our names. To facilitate discussion of print and word meanings. 
Skills: Literacy, communication, letter awareness, listening, turn-taking, letter names, understanding of symbols as conveying meaning.

Blocks

**Materials: large red brick blocks, small red brick blocks, unit blocks, fire trucks, airplanes, trucks, half-circle tunnel shapes, flat planks.
Rationale: To promote the use of blocks to construct roads, tunnels, bridges, and building. To provide a medium for practicing hand-eye coordination, motor planning, balance, construction, and engineering skills. Skills: Inquiry, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, creative expression, understanding of gravity and mass.

Large Motor

**Materials: climbing ladders, monkey bars, notch blocks, climber with donut slide, A-frame with ladder bridge Rationale: To provide more climbing challenges along with opportunities for risk taking. The notch blocks will allow the children to creatively build their own designs for motor challenges. Skills: climbing, upper and lower body strength, balance, hand-eye coordination, spatial awareness, depth perception, physical risk taking, construction skills

Large Group

**Materials: Books about spring, where animals sleep, airplane song, name cards with letter song (I know a girl and her name is Betty, B-E-T-T-Y). Rationale: To bring awareness to the change in seasons. To promote letter and name awareness. To support the development of rhythm, pitch, and patterning. Skills: Sequencing, turn-taking, follow directions, communication, listening, attention span, musical awareness.

Music/Movement

**Materials: new drums, maracas, piano, sandpaper blocks, movement ribbons and scarves.
Rationale: To promote sound experimentation by exploring different instruments. To experiment with volume and tone. To connect sound to the sense of hearing. To encourage movement to music and promote dance as a form of creative expression. 
Skills: imitation, communication, sense awareness, creative expression, beat and tone awareness

Overview
 Our main goals this first week of spring session are 1) settle back into a routine with the children after spring break and 2) introduce our new student teachers to the children and to our daily routine. Knowing that some of the children have traveled by airplane this break, we are providing airport play in the block area, while firefighter themes will provide some continuity with last session.

Expressive Arts 
In the art area this week, we will continue to make our classroom gift for the Spring Soiree. 
**Materials: LPs, small found objects, glue.
Rationale: To provide a collaborative art experience. To promote social interaction and creative expression. To practice the process of gluing, collage-making, and three-dimensional art.
 Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, collaboration, social interaction, cause and effect, visual-spatial awareness

Sensory
**Materials: play dough, cooking utensils, cut-outs, ingredients 
Rationale: To provide a simple open ended setting for children and new student teachers to "check each other out." 
**Materials: water, scoops, large bottles and buckets
Rationale: To provide children the opportunity to play in a parallel fashion with water, while setting the stage for some cooperative projects (filling the large bottles with water.) 
Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, collaboration -shape vocabulary (round container, square container and hexagon container)

Science
**Materials: Variety of magnets of different sizes and strengths, clipboard and pen. 
Rationale: To allow exploration of the distinctive force of magnetism. To continue to promote recording of comments and observations. To explore making hypothesis and predictions. 
Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication. Awareness that magnets attract on one side but repulse on opposite side. Trail and error (determining which objects connect with magnets and which don't.)

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Fire trucks, fire coats, hats and boots, cell phones, blocks, kitchen
Rationale: To continue to engage in firefighter play - and extend the dramas into the firehouse. Building on the children's increasing familiarity with the Ivan Ulz song/book, "Firetruck" we will have photos of some of the foods eaten at the fire station in that song. 
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation

**Materials: Airplanes, Airport, loose parts for runways, small symbolic play characters, Rationale: To connect with the experience of children who have traveled recently, to encourage information and play scenarios around travel and airports. 
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation

Science/Dramatic Play **Materials: woodland animals, natural materials. Rationale: provide the raw material for exploration of the themes of animal habitats as winter comes to a close. Skills: vocabulary (woodland animals, bears, beavers, hibernation, lair) awareness of change of seasons, storytelling, and creative symbolic representation (cave building materials)

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Rulers, height chart, large and small cutouts, different sized pieces of paper
Rationale: To promote awareness of size and measurement. 
Skills: rational thinking, number awareness, size awareness, communication


**Materials: cones labeled 1-4 with numbers and place holders, small wooden blocks to place on the appropriate squares. Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of number correspondence with amount, one to one correspondence, ordering. Materials: large and small "pill shaped" Rationale: Fine motor work, sorting and color matching. Skills: shape awareness, classification, fine motor

**Materials: Puzzles of airplanes, woodland animals, birds. Rationale: encourage part whole thinking, visual discrimination and fine motor control while relating to classroom themes. **Materials: Seriation Blocks, Skills: seriation, balance.

**Materials: Peg builders. Rationale: provide an early small material construction experience with pegs and boards which are easily connected. Skills: persistence, fine motor, hand strength, motor planning, creativity as well as following model and directions.

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Name cards, Books on spring, wind, magnets, new babies, toileting, alphabet, firefighters, and story books. 
Rationale: encourage pre-literacy skills, development of vocabulary relative to classroom theme areas and create awareness of letters by making new name cards for the student teachers and comparing them to our namecards. Skills: letter and name awareness. To facilitate discussion of print and word meanings. 
Skills: Literacy, communication, letter awareness, listening, turn-taking

Blocks
**Materials: large red brick blocks, small red brick blocks, unit blocks, fire trucks, airplanes, fire helmets, ladders
Rationale: To continue to promote the exploration and inquiry of fire fighters and airports. To provide opportunities to connect fireplay into the airport. 
Skills: Inquiry, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, creative expression

Large Motor
**Materials: New gym arrangement being developed by Lisa's class - watch for more info.

Large Group
**Materials: Books about spring, where animals sleep, Firetruck song and chart with symbols of fire related tools and food from song, name cards with Bingo song ("There is a girl in our class and "Janie" is her name-O") Rationale: To begin discussing one of the central topics of the session, the change in seasons, to continue a familiar song from last session but support the connection to reading by visually charting some of the elements from the song. Letter and name awareness. Skills: Sequencing, turn-taking, follow directions, communication, listening, attention span

Music/Movement
**Materials: new drums, maracas, piano, sandpaper blocks, movement ribbons and scarves
Rationale: To promote sound experimentation by exploring different instruments. To experiment with volume and tone. To connect sound to the sense of hearing. To encourage movement to music and promote dance as a form of creative expression. 
Skills: imitation, communication, sense awareness, creative expression, beat and tone awareness

Snacks: Spring break has challenged our communication systems - trust us that there will be something yummy and healthy served!

Miscellaneous:

We would love to see a photo or two of any adventures you and your child had over spring break - travel related, or just hanging around the house. Bringing in a photo can help a child ease the transition to coming back after break - if your camera wasn't part of your adventure - please feel free to draw a simple "picture" of something that was special to your child during the break - it will provide a nice "ice breaker" for your child and the new student teachers.

Please help us fill the Soiree baskets from the 2-3 year old classrooms - the baby shower basket and the "tea drinkers" basket could both use a little help. And don't forget to get a babysitter for April 9th- it's a wonderful event to build community and support our family scholarship program.

Overview
This week we will be focusing on our goodbyes and the transition to our two week break! We have begun to discuss Kari and Sarah moving on to new schools and have started making our goodbye present for them. The children have expressed that they will miss our student teachers but are looking forward to meeting the new teachers who have been dropping by. We will have our goodbye snacks on Tuesday and Wednesday, and invite parents to join us in thanking our student teachers at snack time, around 10:15. Our curriculum will stay very similar this week in order to ease the transition into break.

Expressive Arts
In the art area this week, we will be making our gifts for our student teachers and our classroom gift for the Spring Soiree.
**Materials: LPs, small found objects, glue
Rationale: To provide a collaborative art experience. To promote social interaction and creative expression. To practice the process of gluing, collage-making, and three dimensional art.
Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, collaboration, social interaction, cause and effect, visual-spatial awareness.
**Materials: Markers, tote bags
Rationale: To create a gift for our student teachers. To demonstrate our thanks for them.
Skills: Fine motor, writing grasp, creative expression, emotional expression

Sensory
**Materials: playdough, oven, refrigerator, cooking utensils, cut-outs, ingredients
Rationale: To provide opportunities to practice self-help skills and real life scenarios. To continue to provide a realistic setting for "cooking" with playdough. Mortar and Pestle to crush rose petals for "ingredients." Skills: fine motor, creative thinking, comparison, cause and effect, symbolic representation
**Materials: sand, water, molds, scoops, buckets
Rationale: To continue to provide children the opportunity to play with a mud-like substance. To practice sculpting and building with sand.
Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, collaboration

Science
**Materials: Oranges, lemons, soaps, markers, carrots, roses, mint, coffee grinds, vanilla extract, molasses. To keep our smelling station fresh, please bring in an object or foodstuff from your home which has a smell. Thanks!
Rationale: To practice using the sense of smell. To continue to promote recording. To explore making hypothesis and predictions.
Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Stethoscopes, bandages, syringes, medication bottles, babies, cot, telephone, height chart, scale, rulers
Rationale: To continue to explore the process of going to the doctor. To connect the idea of emergency vehicles and people that need help to hospitals and doctors.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Rulers, height chart, large and small cut-outs, different sized pieces of paper
Rationale: To promote awareness of size and measurement.
Skills: rational thinking, number awareness, size awareness, communication
**Materials: Shape sort, shape puzzles, seriation puzzles, Unifix cubes
Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of geometric shapes. To practice shape awareness and classification. To continue to promote sorting and grouping.
Skills: shape awareness, classification, fine motor, seriation
**We successfully had "shape hunts" while walking to the gym. It's amazing how many things you can see that are square/rectangle or circle shaped. Less so triangle. Do a shape hunt in your home or while driving to reinforce this activity. And if you can bring in an object which has one of these shapes we would appreciate that too! If the object is too large to bring (like a door or cabinet) take a photo and send it to us digitally and we'll print it.

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Word cards, name cards, markers, crayons, books
Rationale: To continue to encourage pre-literacy skills and help children to see new words like Hot and Cold which appear often in daily life. To continue to practice letter and name awareness. To facilitate discussion of print and word meanings.
Skills: Literacy, communication, letter awareness, listening, turn-taking

Blocks
**Materials: large red brick blocks, small red brick blocks, unit blocks, fire trucks, cement mixers, ambulances, fire helmets, ladders
Rationale: To continue to promote the exploration and inquiry of fire fighters and emergency vehicles as well as other community helpers. To provide opportunities to connect hospitals and helping people to firefighters and ambulances.
Skills: Inquiry, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, creative expression

Large Motor
**Materials: rope ladder, hopscotch painted on the tile floor, ball jump station, trampoline, climber, pitch back, soccer kick. 

Rationale: to give opportunities to swing, climb, balance, and throw. This set up will also promote the practice of negotiating space as well as taking turns as children move throughout the gym. 

Skills: rope ladder: core strength, coordination, balance, climbing, grasping; new hopscotch: dynamic/static balance; ball jump station: risk taking, spatial, temporal and body awareness, depth perception; trampoline: endurance, flexibility and lower body strength, turn taking; pitch back: over hand throw and catching skills; soccer kick: social interaction, kicking, eye-foot coordination.
**Materials: carrots, shovels, buckets, dump trucks, front loaders, molds
Rationale: To promote collaboration and cooperation building snowmen. To encourage experimentation and problem solving.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, collaboration, cooperation, problem solving, creative thinking

Large Group
**Materials: Calendar, multilingual hello song, days of the week song, books about time
Rationale: To begin discussing the near end of term and changing student teachers. To learn about days of the week and months.
Skills: Number awareness, time exploration, turn-taking, follow directions, communication, listening, attention span

Music
**Materials: Accordians, drums, maracas, piano
Rationale: To promote sound experimentation by exploring different instruments. To experiment with volume and tone. To connect sound to the sense of hearing.
Skills: imitation, communication, sense awareness, creative expression
**Materials: ribbons, scarves, musical powerpoint slideshow
Rationale: To connect music to creative movement. To promote dance as a form of creative expression. To continue to explore dance as a form of exercise.
Skills: Creative movement, creative expression, social interaction, collaboration

Snacks
Tuesday: Apples and Sunbutter
Friday: Bananas and Graham Crackers

Winter Lesson Plan 2.28-3.4
Kari Lead Teaching

Overview
Since Ayuko had baby Seiji, our classroom has been adjusting to the change of one less teacher, and we are finally getting back in the swing of things! We have been using this event as a means to focus on doctors and visiting the doctor's office, and the children have shown great interest. This week we will move to the next level by connecting doctors to hospitals and ambulances as a way of helping people. A few weeks ago we began focusing on body awareness, which brought on an exploration of the senses. In the science area we are finishing up the sense of taste and then moving on to the sense of smell. Due to the recent snowfall (and with the hope that we won't have many more!) we will take advantage of the snow and begin working with creating snow people on the playground. A lot of children have mentioned attempting to create a snowman so we will collaborate on how to create a family of snow people outside.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: Small easels, large white pieces of paper, finger paints
Rationale: To provide a collaborative art experience. To promote social interaction and creative expression. To provide a sensory experience within the arts.
Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, comparison, collaboration, social interaction
**Materials: Glue, small objects
Rationale: To create a social experience creating art for the Spring Soiree.
Skills: Collaboration, following instructions, comparison, social interaction

Sensory
**Materials: playdough, oven, refrigerator, cooking utensils, cut-outs, ingredients
Rationale: To provide opportunities to practice self-help skills and real life scenarios. To continue to provide a realistic setting for "cooking" with playdough. Skills: fine motor, creative thinking, comparison, cause and effect, symbolic representation
**Materials: sand, water, molds, scoops, buckets
Rationale: To continue to provide children the opportunity to play with a mud-like substance. To practice sculpting and building with sand.
Skills: Fine motor, problem solving, turn-taking, comparison, collaboration

Science
**Materials: Oranges, mint, onion, coffee grinds, vanilla extract, soap
Rationale: To practice using the sense of smell. To continue to promote recording. To explore making hypothesis and predictions.
Skills: hypothesis, predictions, recording, observation, exploration, communication

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Stethoscopes, bandages, syringes, medication bottles, babies, cot, telephone, height chart, scale, rulers
Rationale: To continue to explore the process of going to the doctor. To connect the idea of emergency vehicles and people that need help to hospitals and doctors.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role-play, symbolic representation

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Rulers, height chart, large and small cut-outs, different sized pieces of paper
Rationale: To promote awareness of size and measurement.
Skills: rational thinking, number awareness, size awareness, communication
**Materials: Shape sort, shape puzzles, seriation puzzles, Unifix cubes
Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of geometric shapes. To practice shape awareness and classification. To continue to promote sorting and grouping.
Skills: shape awareness, classification, fine motor, seriation
**We will be sorting shapes on the light table, so I am asking families to please bring in objects that are different shapes for our children to sort through. The objects should be small and with an identifiable shape. Ex: triangle, sphere, square, ect. We will also be putting shapes on the board by the science table, so if you find any shapes that could be cut out those are welcome as well! Thank you for your help!

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Word cards, name cards, markers, crayons, books
Rationale: To continue to encourage pre-literacy skills. To continue to practice letter and name awareness. To facilitate discussion of print and word meanings.
Skills: Literacy, communication, letter awareness, listening, turn-taking

Blocks
**Materials: large red brick blocks, small red brick blocks, unit blocks, fire trucks, cement mixers, ambulances, fire helmets, ladders
Rationale: To continue to promote the exploration and inquiry of fire fighters and emergency vehicles as well as other community helpers. To provide opportunities to connect hospitals and helping people to firefighters and ambulances.
Skills: Inquiry, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, creative expression

Large Motor
**Materials: rope ladder, hopscotch painted on the tile floor, ball jump station, trampoline, climber, pitch back, soccer kick. 

Rationale: to give opportunities to swing, climb, balance, and throw. This set up will also promote the practice of negotiating space as well as taking turns as children move throughout the gym. 

Skills: rope ladder: core strength, coordination, balance, climbing, grasping; new hopscotch: dynamic/static balance; ball jump station: risk taking, spatial, temporal and body awareness, depth perception; trampoline: endurance, flexibility and lower body strength, turn taking; pitch back: over hand throw and catching skills; soccer kick: social interaction, kicking, eye-foot coordination.
**Materials: carrots, shovels, buckets, dump trucks, front loaders, molds
Rationale: To promote collaboration and cooperation building snowmen. To encourage experimentation and problem solving.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, collaboration, cooperation, problem solving, creative thinking

Large Group
**Materials: Calendar, multilingual hello song, days of the week song, books about time
Rationale: To begin discussing the near end of term and changing student teachers. To learn about days of the week and months.
Skills: Number awareness, time exploration, turn-taking, follow directions, communication, listening, attention span

Music
**Materials: Accordians, drums, maracas, piano
Rationale: To promote sound experimentation by exploring different instruments. To experiment with volume and tone. To connect sound to the sense of hearing.
Skills: imitation, communication, sense awareness, creative expression
**Materials: ribbons, scarves, musical powerpoint slideshow
Rationale: To connect music to creative movement. To promote dance as a form of creative expression. To continue to explore dance as a form of exercise.
Skills: Creative movement, creative expression, social interaction, collaboration

Snack
Tuesday: Hummus and Pretzel Sticks
Friday: Sunflower Butter and Pretzel Sticks

Winter Lesson Plan 2.21 to 2.25
Sarah Lead Teaching

Overview:
This past week has contributed much to the development of our classroom curriculum. First, with the arrival of Ayuko's baby, the theme of doctors and hospitals will be highlighted in order to provide the children with a chance to construct their own understanding of this major event through dramatic play. We will use this as an opportunity to continue our exploration of the body and the five senses. Music, movement, touch and taste will be explored through a variety of modes. The changing weather will also continue to be a key component of the upcoming curriculum. The warmer weather and melting snow will provide a starting point for a number of discussions about seasons which we will have throughout the week (i.e. why are there seasons? Why does it get warm in the spring time and cold in winter?). Finally, we will continue our cooking theme by providing the children with opportunities to practice cooking with play dough and other materials, as well as participating in a real cooking project at the end of the week.

Expressive Arts:
**Materials: Easel, different sizes of white and brown paper, finger paints (in natural colors, such as brown, green and white), pictures of melting snow and mud.
Rationale: To build on creative expression and practice representational art. To provide a hands-on sensory experience in paint mixing.
Skills: Fine motor, cause and effect, creative expression, trying out new things, observation, comparison.
**Materials: Play dough, cooking utensils, "oven," and "stove top," play kitchen.
Rationale: To support creative expression and symbolic representation. To provide opportunities to act out "mixing "and "making" food. To provide a realistic backdrop for "cooking" with play dough.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, manual dexterity, fine motor, symbolic representation.

Sensory:
**Materials: Sand, water, molds, scooping and straining tools.
Rationale: To provide the children with an opportunity to create mud (with sand and water) and explore its properties in an indoor setting. To compare the mud indoors to that outside.
Skills: fine motor, problem solving, collaboration, communication, creative expression, turn-taking, comparison.

Science:
**Materials: oranges and lemons (with addition of other fruit or vegetables later in the week), charts, facial expression visuals.
Rationale: To introduce the sense of taste. To conduct a taste test of oranges and lemons, compare the flavors, and record their assessment. To introduce new vocabulary, such as sweet and sour.
Skills: Sensory input, exploration, experimentation, observation, trying new things, recording.

Dramatic Play:
**Materials: Stethoscope, bandages, thermometers, stuffed animals/babies, beds, clipboards, syringes.
Rationale: To build upon the interest of doctor's offices, to explore visiting the doctor and "mending" others through play.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role playing, negotiating.
**Materials: Kitchen: Pots and pans, dishes, silverware, wooden spoons, towels, oven mitts, spices, play dough, oven/stove, refrigerator, sink.
Rationale: To build on the interest in cooking, using play dough and various materials (such as dried herbs and salt) to practice "cooking."
Skills: Self-help, communication, collaboration, creative expression, social skills, role play, choice-making, cause and effect

Math and Manipulatives:
**Materials: Montessori seriation blocks, color-sorting games, alphabet and body puzzles.
Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of sorting and grouping by one or more characteristic. To continue mathematical exploration of counting, numbers, seriation. To encourage understanding of the children's own bodies and senses.
Skills: fine motor, sorting, seriation, numerical awareness, counting, body recognition, self-help skills

Language and Literacy:
**Materials: Name and alphabet cards, paper, light table, pencils and markers.
Rationale: To continue to facilitate letter and name awareness. To encourage writing as a form of communication. To promote the development of fine motor skills. To provide the opportunity to trace letters and names as writing practice.
Skills: fine motor, letter awareness, literacy, communication
**Materials: Recipe charts, books related to curriculum areas, books in reading nook, metal pan, magnetic letters, felt boards
Rationale: To create awareness of letters and print. To promote creativity and storytelling. To understand and follow pictorial directions. To build familiarity with books and the alphabet. To apply new concepts to play.
Skills: letter awareness, creative expression, fine motor, literacy, phonological awareness, listening, communication, numerical awareness, turn taking

Blocks:
**Materials: Planks, small ladders, small hollow blocks, fire trucks, police cars, unit blocks, firefighter helmets.
Rationale: To explore the roles of (and materials used by) fire fighters and police officers. To encourage dramatic play and collaborative play.
Skills: Problem solving, experimentation, role play, creative expression, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, collaboration, communication

Large Motor:
**Materials: rope ladder, hopscotch painted on the tile floor, ball jump station, trampoline, climber, pitch back, soccer kick. 

Rationale: to give opportunities to swing, climb, balance, and throw. This set up will also promote the practice of negotiating space as well as taking turns as children move throughout the gym. 

Skills: rope ladder: core strength, coordination, balance, climbing, grasping; new hopscotch: dynamic/static balance; ball jump station: risk taking, spatial, temporal and body awareness, depth perception; trampoline: endurance, flexibility and lower body strength, turn taking; pitch back: over hand throw and catching skills; soccer kick: social interaction, kicking, eye-foot coordination.
**Materials: Outdoors: Treasure hunting, shovels and buckets, snow plow vehicles, molds.
Rationale: To begin a "treasure hunt "activity and look for marks that indicate where to look for these items. To encourage experimentation and problem solving. To practice snow manipulation and collaborate on building snow structures.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, experimentation, collaboration, discussion, observation, prediction, comparison, exploring novel situations, problem-solving

Large Group:
**Materials: Songs with a variety of languages, books and songs to promote phonological awareness, stories/songs related to spring and melting snow.
Rationale: To introduce a variety of cultures, languages, and songs. To continue to encourage letter and numerical awareness. To foster discussion about spring and the changing seasons. To build a classroom community by sharing a common experience.
Skills: Turn-taking, attention span, communication, follow directions, awareness and respect for others

Music:
**Materials: piano, drums, tambourines, bells, sand blocks, shakers.
Rationale: To explore volume and sound To compare the volume and tone of different instruments. To facilitate social interaction. To connect sound to our exploration of hearing and the five senses.
Skills: creative expression, imitation, communication, awareness of senses,
**Materials: fabric, CDs, videos on computer
Rationale: To connect music to creative movement. To introduce new genres and languages of songs. To explore creative movement and kinesthetic awareness. To explore dance as a form of exercise and self-expression.
Skills: creative movement and expression, self-confidence, social interaction, collaboration, bodily awareness

Snacks:
Tuesday: Pretzels and Craisins
Friday: Animal Crackers and Milk

Winter Lesson Plan 2.14-2.19
Co-Lead Teaching

Overview:
There are a few curriculum themes that are developing in the classroom. We have been focusing on body awareness, incorporating dancing and movement, and senses of touch and taste. The children have been particularly excited to listen and dance to songs and music that are from different genres. Recording our height and growth will also be highlighted this week. As we are getting close to Spring and warm weather is approaching, we will have many discussions about what we can do outdoors with the warm, melted snow. There will be provocations: Why is the snow melting? Where is the "white" snow? What happened to the ice? Our classroom curriculum areas and outdoors will support these emerging interests.
Expressive Arts:
**Materials: Easel, different sizes of white paper, water, water color cakes, paint brushes
Rationale: To build on creative expression and practice using different brushes at the easel.
Skills: Fine motor, cause and effect, creative expression, try out new things, observation, comparison.
**Materials: Play dough, cooking utensils, "oven, and stove top."
Rationale: To support creative expression and symbolic representation. To provide opportunities to act out "mixing "and "making" food.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, manual dexterity, fine motor, symbolic representation.
Sensory:
**Materials: large blocks of ice, water spray, penguins, polar bears, seals, hammers, screwdrivers, cups, water, two types of salt
Rationale: To continue the children's knowledge, understanding, and exploration of ice. To see and feel the effect of salt over ice.
Skills: fine motor, problem solving, collaboration, communication, creative expression, turn-taking
**Materials: soft fabric, rough materials
Rationale: To expose develop awareness for rough and soft materials. To connect the senses of touch and sight.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, exploration, mathematic logic, problem solving.
Science:
**Materials: oranges and lemons (with addition of other fruit or vegetables later in the week), charts, facial expression visuals.
Rationale: To introduce the sense of taste. To conduct a taste test of oranges and lemons, compare the flavors, and record their assessment. To introduce new vocabulary, such as sweet and sour.
Skills: Sensory input, exploration, experimentation, observation, try out, record.
Dramatic Play:
**Materials: Stethoscope, bandages, thermometers, stuffed animals
Rationale: To introduce the emerging interest that occurred last weekend about going to the doctor's office.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, role play, negotiating.
**Materials: Kitchen: Pots and Pans, Dishes, Silverware, wooden spoons, towels, oven mitts, spices. Grocery Store: baskets, food boxes, plastic food, grocery bags, "credit" cards
Rationale: To continue building awareness of where food from home comes from. To act-out going to the grocery store, come home to store and sort the food away, and "cook."
Skills: Self-help, communication, collaboration, creative expression, social skills, role play, choice-making, cause and effect

Math and Manipulatives:
**Materials: Sorting manipulatives, nesting books. body puzzles, counting/alphabet puzzles.
Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of sorting items. To continue mathematical exploration of counting, numbers, seriation. To encourage understanding of the children's own bodies.
Skills: fine motor, sorting, seriation, numerical awareness, counting, body recognition, self-help skills

Language and Literacy:
**Materials: Name cards, markers, alphabet stencils.
Rationale: To continue to facilitate letter and name awareness. To encourage writing as a form of communication. To promote the development of fine motor skills.
Skills: fine motor, letter awareness, literacy, communication
**Materials: Grocery lists, recipe charts, books related to curriculum areas, books in reading nook, metal pan, magnetic letters, felt boards
Rationale: To create awareness of letters and print. To promote creativity and storytelling. To understand and follow pictorial directions. To build familiarity with books and the alphabet. To apply new concepts to play.
Skills: letter awareness, creative expression, fine motor, literacy, phonological awareness, listening, communication, numerical awareness, turn taking
Blocks:
**Materials: Planks, tubes and gutters, ramps, small hollow blocks, small hotwheel cars, unit blocks, cylindrical and round objects.
Rationale: To continue to experiment with ramp manipulation and development. To continue to experiment with how fast or slow different objects roll down the ramps.
Skills: Problem solving, experimentation, role play, creative expression, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, collaboration, communication, prediction

Large Motor:
**Materials: rope swing, blue slide and stairs, area for throwing/target practice, bolster hill, balance beam.
Rationale: To continue to promote physical development through balance, coordination, upper body and core strength. To foster social interaction and turn-taking through sharing the same equipment. To foster spatial awareness, awareness of the environment, self and others. 


Skills: Core strength, coordination, balance, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception, climbing, upper and lower body strength, motor planning, grasping, turn taking, and social interaction

**Materials: Fabric, dancing dresses, CDs, music, tambourines
Rationale: To incorporate "dancing" as part of an exercise activity and relate this concept to health and how it affects our bodies. To encourage creative movement. To create independence while choosing music.
Skills: Creative expression, large motor, social skills, role play, collaboration, communication
Please continue to share your child's favorite song, songs, or CDs with us so we could offer them as options for the dance area. We will be creating playlists on the computer so the children will have the option to choose a song for listening and dancing.

**Materials: Outdoors: Treasure hunting, colored water in spray bottles, shovels and buckets, sleds, snow plow vehicles.
Rationale: To begin a "treasure hunt "activity and look for marks that indicate where to look for these items. To explore the results of adding color to the snow. To encourage experimentation and problem solving. To practice snow manipulation.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, experimentation, collaboration, discussion, observation, prediction, comparison, exploring novel situations, problem-solving

Large Group:
**Materials: Songs with a variety of languages, book "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom" to continue letter awareness, number songs and rhymes led by teacher.
Rationale: To introduce a variety of culture, languages, and songs. To continue to encourage letter and numerical awareness. To encourage awareness of each other by sharing a common experience.
Skills: Turn-taking, attention span, communication, follow directions, awareness and respect for others

Music:
**Materials: piano, drums, tambourines, song cards, sand blocks.
Rationale: To explore volume and sound. To facilitate social interaction. To connect volume to hearing, as one of the five senses.
Skills: creative expression, imitation, communication, awareness of senses,
**Materials: dance dresses, fabric, cds, playlists on computer
Rationale: To connect music to creative movement. To introduce new genres and languages of songs. To explore body movement. To explore dance as a form of exercise.
Skills: creative movement and expression, self-confidence, social interaction, collaboration

Snacks:
Tuesday:Crackers and milk
Friday:Toast and Jam

Winter Lesson Plan 2.7-2.11
Kari Lead Teaching

Overview:
The themes of winter, snow, and ice are still very relevant in our classroom and the children are continually showing interest in the topics. We are continuing to apply that theme throughout the classroom. To extend play in the kitchen/grocery store area, we will be adding recipes and grocery lists for the children to use. We will also discuss the concept of what types of food make our bodies warm and cold. On Friday, the children will be cooking with Sarah, making cold yogurt smoothies. We will relate this activity to how our bodies feel when we drink it and then revisit the idea of how our bodies feel once we get dressed in warm clothes to go outside. From receiving many grocery items (thank you, parents) and having conversations at the snack tables, we found that the children eat nutritious food at home. Because of this, we have decided to deepen the concept of "what is nutritious?" and introduce the idea of sorting and labeling food as healthy or unhealthy. We will connect this concept to keeping our bodies healthy and discuss what we can do to maintain good health. It seems that children have also had a growing interest in letters and writing. We have noticed some children writing letters and asking questions about words. To encourage this essential skill we will be turning the art table into a writing center. We will also connect literacy to other areas of the classroom.

Expressive Arts:
**Materials: Easel, white paper, water, water color cakes, paint brushes
Rationale: To extend the exploration of liquid watercolors in the science area to watercolor cakes on the art easels. To build on creative expression and to practice using different mediums.
Skills: Fine motor, creative expression, try out new things, observation, comparison

**Materials: "glurch" (compound of liquid starch and glue), drying rack, cutting tools, molds and presses
Rationale: To continue exploration of the material glurch. To practice observation, prediction, and testing hypothesis. To try out new tools and create new ways of manipulation.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, prediction, hypothesis, cause and effect, manual dexterity

Sensory:
**Materials: large blocks of ice, penguins, polar bears, seals, hammers, screwdrivers, saws, monkey wrenches, small fish, measuring cups, water, salt
Rationale: To continue the children's knowledge, understanding, and exploration of ice. To begin introducing the inquiry stage of the learning cycle, develop their curiosity and problem solve on how to melt and break ice. To work on collaboration of ideas between children. To support symbolic play and representation with the animals and the ice.
Skills: fine motor, problem solving, collaboration, communication, creative expression, turn-taking

Science:
**Materials: soft fabric, rough materials
Rationale: To introduce two of the five senses. To connect the senses of touch and sight and promote logical thinking and mathematical skill of sorting with rough and soft materials.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, exploration, mathematic logic, problem solving

Dramatic Play:
**Materials: Kitchen: Pots and Pans, Dishes, Silverware, wooden spoons, towels, oven mitts, spices. Grocery Store: baskets, shelves, food boxes, plastic food, grocery bags, "conveyor belt", shopping carts, "credit" cards
Rationale: To practice and build on cooking skills. To connect purchasing food and cooking food. To continue to practice and act-out going to the grocery store. To act out and connect how the body temperature changes with cold and hot food.
Skills: Self-help, communication, collaboration, creative expression, social skills, role play, choice-making, cause and effect

Math and Manipulatives:
**Materials: Sorting baskets for cloth and healthy vs. unhealthy food, body puzzles, counting/alphabet puzzles, stringing beads, counting bears
Rationale: To promote the mathematical concept of sorting items. To encourage understanding of the children's own bodies. To begin awareness of the concept of what is healthy for our bodies. To continue mathematical exploration of counting and numbers.
Skills: fine motor, sorting, numerical awareness, counting, letter recognition, body recognition, self-help skills

Language and Literacy:
**Materials: Letter cards, alphabet, pencils, writing paper, name cards
Rationale: To facilitate letter awareness. To encourage writing as a form of communication. To promote the development of fine motor skills.
Skills: fine motor, letter awareness, literacy, communication
**Materials: Grocery lists, recipe charts, books related to curriculum areas, books in reading nook
Rationale: To create awareness of letters and print. To understand and follow pictorial directions. To build familiarity with books and the alphabet. To apply new concepts to play.
Skills: phonological awareness, listening, communication, numerical awareness, turn taking
**Materials: metal pan, magnetic letters, felt boards
Rationale: To facilitate letter awareness. To promote creativity and storytelling.
Skills: letter awareness, creative expression, fine motor, literacy

Blocks:
**Materials: Planks, tubes and gutters, ramps, small hollow blocks, unit blocks, white fabric, small cars, cylindrical objects, penguins.
Rationale: To continue to experiment with ramp manipulation and development. To create homes and play space, such as a slide, for artic animals. To continue to experiment with how fast or slow different objects roll down the ramps.
Skills: Problem solving, experimentation, role play, creative expression, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, collaboration, communication, prediction

Large Motor:
**Materials: Wall ladder, rope swing, blue slide and stairs, area for throwing/target practice, bolster hill, balance beam.
Rationale: To continue to promote physical development through balance, coordination, upper body and core strength. To foster social interaction and turn-taking through sharing the same equipment. To foster spatial awareness, awareness of the environment, self and others. 


Skills: Core strength, coordination, balance, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception, climbing, upper and lower body strength, motor planning, grasping, turn taking, and social interaction

**Materials: Fabric, dancing dresses, CDs, music, tambourines
Rationale: To incorporate "dancing" as part of an exercise activity and relate this concept to health and how it affects our bodies. To encourage creative movement. To create independence while choosing music.
Skills: Creative expression, large motor, social skills, role play, collaboration, communication
We would love for parents to share their child's favorite song, songs, or CDs with us so we could offer them as options for the dance area. We will be creating playlists on the computer so the children will have the option to choose a song for listening and dancing.

**Materials: Outdoors: Snow and ice on the playground, colored water in spray bottles, shovels and buckets, sleds, snow plow vehicles, large ocean/arctic animals
Rationale: To explore the results of adding color to the snow. To encourage experimentation and problem solving. To practice snow manipulation.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, experimentation, collaboration, discussion, observation, prediction, comparison, exploring novel situations, problem-solving

Large Group:
**Materials: Healthy vs. unhealthy food cards, book "Chicka Chicka Boom Boom" to continue letter awareness, number songs and rhymes led by teacher, "Head, shoulders, knees and toes" song to connect awareness of body parts, discussions of what is healthy for our bodies as well as what we can do to keep our bodies healthy.
Rationale: To make the connection of health and our bodies. To continue to encourage letter and numerical awareness. To encourage awareness of each other by sharing a common experience.
Skills: Turn-taking, attention span, communication, follow directions, awareness and respect for others

Music:
**Materials: piano, shakers
Rationale: To explore volume and sound. To facilitate social interaction. To connect volume to hearing, as one of the five senses.
Skills: creative expression, imitation, communication, awareness of senses,
**Materials: dance dresses, fabric, cds, playlists on computer, tambourines
Rationale: To connect music to creative movement. To explore body movement. To explore dance as a form of exercise.
Skills: creative movement and expression, self-confidence, social interaction, collaboration

Snacks:
Tuesday: Trial mix and milk
Friday: Cooking with Sarah - yogurt smoothies

Winter Lesson Plan
January 31-February 4 


Sarah Lead Teaching

Overview:


Over the past few weeks, the children have continued to show an interest in snow and ice, especially with the addition of snow in the sensory table. The children have been particularly interested in the new 'frozen fish,' as they have used their problem-solving skills and some tools (including hammers, screwdrivers and warm water) to get the fish out of the cubes of ice. We also want to build on the children's growing interest in story telling and rhyming by providing opportunities to tell stories and create rhymes in the classroom. The children's interest in cooking in the kitchen has inspired us to provide them with an opportunity to "shop" for the ingredients necessary for their own cooking endeavors. We will continue to foster their communication skills, creativity and problem-solving skills in the upcoming weeks with these alterations.
Expressive Arts 



**Materials: butcher paper, glue, and various collage materials.
Rationale: To build on gluing and creative skills. To interpret nature through artistic representation. To create artwork in collaboration with other children. To communicate creative ideas to others.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new ideas, creativity, persistence, artistic expression, symbolic representation.

**Materials: Easel, white paper, various paint colors, rollers, toy cars.
Rationale: To explore color mixing. To try out painting with novel tools. To build on creative expression. 

Skills: Fine motor, try out new things, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.

**Materials: "glurch" (compound of liquid starch and glue), markers, molds and presses, cutting tools, cooking ingredients such as sand, and herbs.
Rationale: To explore a new substance and its liquid and solid states. To practice observation, make predictions, and test hypotheses. To try out a variety of new tools to see cause and effect relationships. 
To practice mixing ingredients and testing out 'recipes'. 

Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, turn taking, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, cause and effect, creativity.

Sensory

**Materials: Snow, Measuring cups, Small water bottles, Plastic animals, Shovels, Water, Tools (screwdrivers, hammers, saws), Ice, Plastic fish in ice cubes

Rationale: To experiment with cause and effect as the snow melts through their own manipulation and use of water. To support symbolic play of hibernation with plastic animals. To encourage problem-solving skills in breaking/melting ice.

Skills: Sensory input, turn taking, comparison, observation, prediction, imitation, fine motor, cause and effect, creative expression, role play, problem-solving
Science

**Materials: light table, water color paints and brushes, coffee filters, contact paper, butcher paper, flashlights.
Rationale: To encourage exploration of colors, mixing them and using them in different media (i.e. on coffee filters vs. butcher paper). To raise awareness of the possibilities and consequences of mixing different colors together. To build on this awareness and encourage exploration through color-mixing in different media. To explore the differences in color when water and light are added to paints. 

Skills: Exploration, comparison, observation, fine motor, prediction, creative expression

Dramatic Play

**Materials: Kitchen: Pots and Pans, Plastic food, Dishes, Silverware, Cardboard boxes of warm food. Grocery Store: baskets, shelves, food boxes, plastic food, grocery bags, conveyor belt (black paper on low shelf)
Rationale: To determine which foods make the body warm. To connect how the body temperature changes with cold and hot. To practice and build on cooking skills. To encourage independence in choosing and cooking food. To practice and act-out going to the grocery store to buy food to bring home and cook.
Skills: Self-help, communication, collaboration, creative expression, social skills, role play, choice-making, cause and effect


We would love to receive donations of packaging of your child's favorite foods (boxes or plastic containers) so we can pretend to shop for those items. We would also like to compile a list of favorite foods and grocery stores so that teachers can refer to these during play to spark personal connections. Feel free to email us or let us know in person. Paper bags from these stores would also be appreciated.
Math and Manipulatives 



**Materials: seriation and color puzzles, color-matching bears, beads.



Rationale: To classify by color and size, to seriate, and to count. To match items by color. To practice self-help skills, hand-eye coordination, and fine motor control. To understand part to whole relationships in putting together a puzzle. 

Skills: Counting, seriation, classification, matching, sorting, comparison, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination

Language and Literacy 




**Materials: Felt story boards (sea-creatures, castle, Hungry Hungry Caterpillar), books to match with story boards.
Rationale: To increase awareness of story sequencing. To promote creativity in literacy activities (i.e. creating own stories with sequenced events).
Skills: Literacy and pre-literacy, sequencing events, communication, creative expression.
**Materials: Rhyming stories, rebuses depicting steps for cooking and dressing, books related to curriculum areas, books in reading nook.

Rationale: To create phonemic awareness. To practice following print left to right. To understand and follow pictorial directions. To find and apply new information from books to their knowledge and play. To build familiarity with print and books.

Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, sequencing, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, acquiring knowledge from print sources, turn taking. 



Blocks 



**Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks, planks, tubes and gutters, "winter vehicles" such as dump trucks, snow plow, and cars, cylinders for rolling, ramps. 

Rationale: To experiment with the height of ramps, size of vehicles, and properties of other objects (smooth vs. rough blocks) and how these properties affect speed down a ramp. To encourage dramatic play of plowing and loading snow and other construction tasks. To encourage collaboration, prediction, and analysis.


Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas, prediction, analysis
Large Motor 




**Materials: Wall ladder, rope swing, blue slide and stairs, target for throwing/target practice, bolsters.
Rationale: To promote physical development through balance, coordination, upper body and core strength. To foster social interaction through sharing the same equipment. To foster spatial awareness, awareness of the environment, self and others. 


Skills: Core strength, coordination, balance, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception, climbing, upper and lower body strength, motor planning, grasping, turn taking, and social interaction

**Materials: Outdoors: Snow and ice on the playground, colored water in spray bottles, shovels and buckets, sleds, snow plow vehicles, jewels/treasures for scavenger hunt.
Rationale: To explore the possibilities of adding water to snow. To encourage experimentation with color-mixing in snow. To create storylines regarding snow removal. To practice shoveling and scooping snow.
To problem-solve with melting, breaking, and building ice. To use investigation skills to search for treasures.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, experimentation, collaboration, discussion, observation, prediction, comparison, trying new things and exploring novel situations, problem-solving.
Large group
**Materials: Movement and instrument activities, storytelling with felt, discussion of snow in the classroom and outside and how we might make it melt, discussion of the outside temperature and how it affects how we dress. Book "Eeny Meeny Miney Mouse" to listen for rhymes. Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), modeling of activities.


Rationale: To practice rhythmic awareness and literacy skills, phonological awareness, and singing skills. To increase awareness of each other. To connect to others by sharing a common experience.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions, communication.
Music 




**Materials: Piano, drums, and maracas. 




Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To promote social interaction by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play 



Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and response, communication.

Snacks
 

Tuesday: Orange slices and crackers
Friday: Pretzels and milk


Winter Lesson Plan


January 24th-28th 

Teachers Co-Lead Teaching


Overview:

After introducing snow in the sensory table, children have been wondering about different states of snow and ice and have been exploring animals that live in snow. In order to expand this interest, we will encourage children to problem solve about how to melt the snow in the sensory table. Art materials will be introduced that speak to the different textures, luster, patterns, and colors of snow and ice. In the cave area and science table children have been exploring the concepts of light, dark, and color mixing by using flashlights to test different translucent materials. This week we will continue this exploration by adding watercolors to the light table and providing fabric to shine light through.

Expressive Arts 


**Materials: butcher paper, glue, and various collage materials. Rationale: To explore the process of gluing and collage. To interpret nature through artistic representation. To create artwork in collaboration with other children.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new ideas, creativity, persistence, artistic expression, symbolic representation.


**Materials: Easel, dark paper, white and pastel paint colors, and paddle brush. 


Rationale: To explore different textures this painting tool can create. To explore the contrast between the light paint and dark paper. To explore color mixing.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new things, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.


**Materials: "glurch" (compound of liquid starch and glue), markers, molds and presses, cutting tools.


Rationale: To explore a new substance and its liquid and solid states. To practice observation, make predictions, and test hypotheses. To try out a variety of new tools to see cause and effect relationships. 

Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, turn taking, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, cause and effect, creativity.


Sensory
**Materials: Snow, Measuring cups, Small water bottles, Plastic animals, Shovels, Water, Gutters, Ice
Rationale: To experiment with cause and effect as the snow melts through their own manipulation and use of water. To support symbolic play of hibernation with plastic animals.
Skills: Sensory input, turn taking, comparison, observation, prediction, imitation, fine motor, cause and effect, creative expression, role play

Science
**Materials: light table, water color paints and brushes, coffee filters, contact paper, clear water in spray bottles
Rationale: To encourage exploration of colors, mixing them and using them in different media (i.e. on coffee filters vs. contact paper). To raise awareness of the possibilities and consequences of mixing different colors together. To build on this awareness and encourage exploration through color-mixing in different media. To explore the
differences in color when water and light are added to paints.
Skills: Exploration, comparison, observation, fine motor, prediction, creative expression

**Materials: flashlights, colored gel screens (three primary colors), different colored fabrics, colored cellophane, reflective surfaces (mirrors, aluminum foil)
Rationale: To promote hands-on exploration of color and light. To encourage mixing colors in a new medium (light). To explore and compare the differences of reflecting light on different surfaces (i.e. foil vs. mirror).
Skills: Exploration, trying out, comparison, observation, prediction, fine motor

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Babies: Hats, Blankets, Long sleeves, Long pants, Sweaters. Winter Clothing: Snow pants, Jackets, Hats, Mittens, Boots, Mirror. Kitchen: Pots and Pans, Plastic food, Dishes, Silverware, Cardboard boxes of warm food
Rationale: To work on self-help skills by practicing getting themselves dressed in snow gear. To make their own choices on clothing and which items they want to wear. To connect the classroom interest in babies to the theme of snow and ice. To determine which foods make the body warm. To connect how the body temperature changes with cold and hot.
Skills: Self-help, communication, collaboration, creative expression, social skills, role play, choice-making, cause and effect
.
We would love to receive donations of packaging of your child's favorite warm food (i.e., soup box, hot chocolate container) so we can pretend to come in from the cold and eat cozy food. We would also like to compile a list of favorite foods so that teachers can refer to these during play to spark personal connections. Feel free to let us know through email or in person.

**Materials: A world map, post-it notes, small pictures of airplanes to stick on the map, dry erase markers. 


Rationale: To become familiar with the world map and concepts of countries, cities, travel, and distance. To explore symbols and symbolic representation.


Skills: Role play, prediction, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills





Math and Manipulatives 



**Materials: seriation and color puzzles, lacing cards, beads.


Rationale: To classify by color and size, to seriate, and to count. To practice self-help skills, hand-eye coordination, and fine motor control. To understand part to whole relationships in putting together a puzzle.
Skills: Counting, seriation, classification, sorting, comparison, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination


Language and Literacy 



**Materials: Rhyming stories, rebuses depicting steps for cooking and dressing, books related to curriculum areas, books in reading nook.
Rationale: To create phonemic awareness. To practice following print left to right. To understand and follow pictorial directions. To find and apply new information from books to their knowledge and play. To build familiarity with print and books.
Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, sequencing, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, acquiring knowledge from print sources, turn taking. 




Blocks 



**Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks, planks, tubes and gutters, "winter vehicles" such as dump trucks, snow plow, and cars. 


Rationale: To experiment with the height of ramps, size of vehicles, and properties of other objects (smooth vs. rough blocks) and how these properties affect speed down a ramp. To encourage dramatic play of plowing and loading snow and other construction tasks. To encourage collaboration, prediction, and negotiation.

Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas


Large Motor 



**Materials: Wall ladder, monkey bars with rope swings, blue slide and foam donut to jump to, A-frame ladders with connecting bridge, and Pedalo and scooters.

Rationale: To promote physical development through balance, coordination, upper body and core strength. To foster social interaction through sharing the same equipment. 

Skills: Core strength, coordination, balance, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception, bilateral movement, climbing, upper and lower body strength, motor planning, grasping, turn taking, and social interaction


**Materials: Outdoors: Snow and ice on the playground, colored water in spray bottles, shovels and buckets, sleds, snow plow vehicles.
Rationale: To explore the possibilities of adding water to snow. To encourage experimentation with color-mixing in snow. To create storylines regarding snow removal. To practice shoveling and scooping snow.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, experimentation, collaboration, discussion, observation, prediction, comparison, trying new things and exploring novel situations

Large group 



**Materials: Discussion of snow in the classroom and outside and how we might make it melt, discussion of the outside temperature and how it affects how we dress and whether snow melts. Book "Eeny Meeny Miney Mouse" to listen for rhymes. Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), dance and instrument activities, modeling of activities


Rationale: To practice rhythmic awareness, phonological awareness, and singing skills. To increase awareness of each other. To share in a common experience.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions, pitch, rhythm, rhyming.

Music 



**Materials: Piano, drums, and shakers. 



Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To promote social interaction by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play 


Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and response, communication.


Snacks
 

Tuesday: Raisins and graham crackers
Friday: apples and animal crackers

Winter Lesson Plan

January 18th-21st
Teachers Co-Lead Teaching
Overview:

The cold weather has been a predominant topic with the children these past couple of weeks. The children have been talking about snow plows, making tracks in snow and looking for tracks. We will continue to focus on the weather, snow, and ice as the children learn about the contrast of warmth and cold and discover ways to manipulate these natural materials. Color mixing has also peeked the children's curiosity recently. In the upcoming weeks, we want to expand on this topic and implement the science of color into various areas of the classroom curriculum.
Expressive Arts 

**Materials: Easel, dark paper, white and pastel paint colors, and paddle brush. 

Rationale: To experiment using a different form of painting utensil. To continue to promote creative expression while providing colors that represent snow and winter. To create a contrast between light paint and dark background.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new things, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.
**Materials: 4x4 inch square white paper, a variety of colored construction paper, hole punchers, crayons, markers, stickers, and scissors. 

Rationale: The children will continue to create their personal "art decorations" to be hung on the classroom board. To provide the opportunity to experiment and creatively express oneself with materials provided. To create artwork in collaboration with other children.

Skills: Fine motor, try out new ideas, creativity, persistence, artistic expression.
**Materials: two primary colored play dough, rolling pins, cheese slicers, odd shaped tools, number cookie cutters.

Rationale: To experiment mixing and molding two different primary colors. To try out a variety of new tools to see cause and effect relationships. 

Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, turn taking, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, cause and effect, try out, creativity.
Sensory 

** Materials: Snow, measuring cups, shovels, plastic animals
Rationale: To explore molding and digging snow in a smaller container. To explore how snow melts over time. To connect how animals deal with and play in the cold snow to how we play with the snow.
Skills: Sensory input, turn taking, comparison, observation, prediction, imitation, fine motor

Science 

**Materials: light table, washable markers, coffee filters, saran wrap, vis-à-vis markers.
Rationale: To encourage exploration of colors, mixing them and using them in different media (i.e. on coffee filters vs. saran wrap). To raise awareness of the possibilities and consequences of mixing different colors together.
Skills: Exploration, comparison, observation, fine motor, prediction

**Materials: flashlights, colored gel screens (three primary colors), different colored fabrics, colored saran wrap or fabric
Rationale: To promote hands-on exploration of color and light. To encourage mixing colors in a new medium (light).
Skills: Exploration, trying out, comparison, observation, prediction, fine motor.
**Materials: Snow and Ice in the playground. 

Rationale: To compare, observe, mold, feel, and begin wondering about the difference between snow and ice and what it is made out of. To explore how we can alter and affect the snow and ice.
Skills: Ideas, discussion, experimenting, observation, try out ideas, cause and effect, predicting.
Dramatic Play 

**Materials:Winter Clothing in the "mud room," Snow pants, Jackets, Hats, Mittens, Boots.
Rationale: To work on self-help skills by practicing getting ready to go outside in the snow.
Skills: Self-help, communication, collaboration, creative expression, social skills, role play
**Materials: Household kitchen furniture, plates, bowls, cups, food, high chair, babies, warm baby clothes, blankets, bottles, and crib.

Rationale: To connect Ayuko's pregnancy and the classroom interest in babies to the current theme of snow, ice and winter through dressing the babies for warm weather and preparing food that warms the body up. To provide an opportunity to symbolically represent the children's experiences or curiosity of taking care of babies, making, and serving food for themselves and others. 

Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.

**Materials: A world map, post-it notes, small pictures of airplanes to stick on the map, small pictures of a variety of animals, dry erase markers. 

Rationale: To begin exploring the world map and learning new words such as continent, country, ocean, route, and destination. To promote awareness of where a variety of animals originated (i.e. Panda - China. Koala - Australia). 

Skills: Role play, prediction, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills



Math and Manipulatives 


**Materials: Lacing cards, large beads and string (beading), and puzzles

Rationale: To provide opportunities to sort by color and count with one-to-one correspondence. To provide materials that support hand-eye coordination and fine motor control. To understand part to whole relationships in putting together a puzzle. 

Skills: Counting, sorting, comparison, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination
Language and Literacy 


**Materials: Rhyming stories, sequencing steps, and a variety of books being displayed in different curriculum areas as well as the reading nook. 


Rationale: To promote awareness of rhymes. To recognize and refer to sequencing steps to follow directions. To find and apply new information in books to their knowledge and play, while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language. Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, sequencing, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information, turn taking. 


Blocks 


**Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks, planks, "winter vehicles" such as dump trucks, snow plow, and cars. 

Rationale: To encourage dramatic play of plowing and loading snow. To construct and create vehicles to support the story lines of traveling. To experiment with the height of ramps and how it effects the speed of the vehicles. To encourage collaboration, prediction, and negotiation.
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas
Large Motor 


**Materials: Wall ladder, monkey bars with rope swings, blue slide and foam cylinders with climbing rope, A-frame ladders with the donut hole and a connecting bridge, and Pedalo.
Rationale: To promote physical development through balance, coordination, upper body and core strength. To foster social interaction through sharing the same equipment.
Skills: Core strength, coordination, balance, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception, bilateral movement, climbing, upper and lower body strength, motor planning, grasping, turn taking, and social interaction
**Materials: Outdoors: Snow and ice on the playground, colored water in spray bottles, Sleds, Shovels, Buckets, Dump trucks, Snow/ice
Rationale: To explore the possibilities of adding water to snow and discuss how we alter the snow and the ice outside. To encourage experimentation with color-mixing in snow. To discover how we can move snow as well as how we can mold it to create our own structures.
Skills: Fine and gross motor, experimentation, collaboration, discussion, observation, prediction, comparison, trying new things/exploring novel situations, cause and effect, self-expression, social skills, trying out new ideas.
Large group 


**Materials: Creating a provocation - can we make a snow house? A snow person? Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), reading "Snowy Day" by Ezra Jack Keats, dance and instrument activities, modeling of activities.
Rationale: To increase awareness of each other. To sings songs that are familiar as we get used to the school routine again.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.
Music 


**Materials: Piano, drums, and shakers. 


Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To promote social interaction by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play 

Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.
Snacks

Tuesday: Trail mix and milk
Friday: Apples and graham crackers

Winter Lesson Plan

January 10th-14th 

Ayuko and Elizabeth Lead Teaching

Overview:

As the children and new teachers settle in, our focus will be on building new relationships and strengthening existing ones. As we continue to discuss Ayuko's pregnancy, the children will have the opportunity to role-play caring for babies and pets in the dramatic play area. Themes of transportation and construction will be highlighted to allow children to deepen and develop current play themes. Winter weather and winter animals will be featured in the cave area and in large group discussions to bring awareness of the surrounding environment.

Expressive Arts 

**Materials: Easel, black paper, white and pastel paint colors. 

Rationale: To promote creative expression while providing colors that represent snow. To create a contrast between light paint and dark background. 

Skills: Fine motor, try out new things, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.

**Materials: 4x4 inch square white paper, a variety of colored construction paper, hole punchers, crayons, markers, stickers, and scissors. 

Rationale: The children will continue to create their personal "art decorations" to be hung on the classroom board. To provide the opportunity to experiment and creatively express oneself with materials provided. To create artwork in collaboration with other children.

Skills: Fine motor, try out new ideas, creativity, persistence, artistic expression.

**Materials: Playdoh, rolling pins, cheese slicers, odd shaped tools, and cookie molds.

Rationale: To experiment with a variety of new tools. To try out materials to see the cause and effect relationship. 

Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, turn taking, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, cause and effect, try out, creativity.

Sensory 

**Materials: Liquid soap in small containers, water, variety of containers, cups, hand mixers, funnels. 

Rationale: To explore how bubbles are created by experimenting with adding soap to water. To begin wondering how tools can create more bubbles. 

Skills: Sensory input, turn-taking, comparison, observation, imitation, prediction, trying out new ideas, fine motor

Science 

**Materials: Light table, primary color water, Petri dishes, cups, pipettes

Rationale: To provide the opportunity to explore colors and mixing them. To encourage color mixing with liquids. To make predictions and observe cause and effect.
Skills: Observation, prediction, fine motor, comparison, try out

To extend the exploration of color, we have a color board display. We would appreciate donations of natural and non-natural materials such as leaves, tinsel, ribbons, orange peel, etc, to school so we can begin sorting and displaying them on the board by color. The colors will be sorted by Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, and Purple.

**Materials: Animal fur, stuffed woodland animals, winter animal visuals, animal books with winter and hibernation themes

Rationale: To act out, make sense of, and discuss the process and reason for hibernation and how animals survive in the winter. 

Skills: Ideas, discussion, observation, sensory input

**Materials: Snow and Ice in the playground. 

Rationale: To compare, observe, mold, feel, and begin wondering about the difference between snow and ice and what it is made out of. To explore how we can alter and affect the snow and ice.
Skills: Ideas, discussion, experimenting, observation, try out ideas, cause and effect, predicting.

Dramatic Play 

**Materials: Household kitchen furniture, plates, bowls, cups, food, high chair, babies, baby clothes, blankets, bottles, and crib.

Rationale: To act out story lines of taking care of babies as Ayuko continues to discuss her pregnancy with the children. To provide an opportunity to symbolically represent the children's experiences or curiosity of taking care of babies, making, and serving food for themselves and others. 

Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.


**Materials: Wooden trains, airplanes, cars, maps, post-it notes, small pictures of airplanes to stick on the map. 

Rationale: To provide an opportunity to reenact some of the travel experiences the children may have had over winter break. 

Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills




Math and Manipulatives 


**Materials: Sewing blocks, counting matching game, seriation stackers, puzzles

Rationale: To support awareness of numbers and counting. To provide materials that support hand-eye coordination and fine motor control. To understand part to whole relationships in putting together a puzzle. 

Skills: Counting, comparison, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination

Language and Literacy 


**Materials: A variety of books being displayed in different curriculum areas as well as the reading nook. 


Rationale: To promote finding and applying new information in books to their knowledge and play, while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language. 


Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information, turn taking. 



Blocks 


**Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks, planks, vehicles

Rationale: To encourage construction and creating airports, houses, garage, train tracks, and bridges, to support the story lines of traveling. To encourage collaboration and negotiation.
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas

Large Motor 


**Materials: Wall ladder, monkey bars with rope swings, blue slide and foam cylinders with climbing rope, A-frame ladders with the donut hole and a connecting bridge, and Pedalo.
Rationale: To promote physical development through balance, coordination, upper body and core strength. To foster social interaction through sharing the same equipment.
Skills: Core strength, coordination, balance, risk taking, spatial awareness, depth perception, bilateral movement, climbing, upper and lower body strength, motor planning, grasping, turn taking, and social interaction

**Materials: Outdoors: Sleds, buckets, shovels, looking for and making tracks. 

Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills including a focus on balancing and coordination skills. To facilitate activities that promote usage of snow and ice.

Skills: Fine and large motor, body manipulation, physical fitness, hand-eye coordination, cause and effect, turn-taking

Large group 


**Materials: Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), reading "Snowy Day" by Ezra Jack Keats, dance and instrument activities, modeling of activities

Rationale: To build familiarity with new teachers. To increase awareness of each other. To sings songs that are familiar as we get used to the school routine again.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music 


**Materials: Piano, drums, and shakers. 


Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To promote social interaction by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play 

Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.

Snacks

Tuesday:Bananas and graham crackers
Friday:Raisins and rice cakes

Winter Lesson Plan 2AM
January 4th -7th
Ayuko and Elizabeth Lead Teaching

Overview:
As we welcome the children and families back from the long winter break, we plan to keep things simple to allow easy interactions with our new student teacher team. We are assuming that some children may have had travel experiences during break so we will have trains, planes, cars, and maps available to capitalize on the memories. The snow scenery will be featured in the cave with a variety of woodland animals as they hibernate for the winter. Learning the basic steps of dressing for the winter outdoors (snowpants and boots and the rest) will be a big focus of our early days together.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: Easel, black paper, white and pastel paint colors.
Rationale: To promote creative expression while providing colors that represent snow. To create a contrast between light paint and dark background.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new things, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.

**Materials: 4x4 inch square white paper, a variety of colored construction paper, hole punchers, crayons, markers, stickers, and scissors.
Rationale: Square papers will be available for the children to begin creating their personal "art decorations" to be hung on the classroom board. To provide the opportunity to experiment and creatively express oneself with materials provided. To create artwork in collaboration with other children.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new ideas, creativity, persistence, artistic expression.

**Materials: Playdoh, rolling pins, cheese slicers, odd shaped tools, and cookie molds.
Rationale: To experiment with a variety of new tools. To try out materials to see the cause and effect relationship.
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, turn taking, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, cause and effect, try out, creativity.

Sensory
**Materials: Liquid soap, water, variety of containers, cups, hand mixers, funnels.
Rationale: To experiment with how bubbles are created by using a variety of tools. To begin wondering which tool can create more bubbles.
Skills: Sensory input, turn-taking, comparison, observation, imitation, prediction, trying out new ideas, fine motor

Science
**Materials: Light table, primary color water, Petri dishes, cups, pipettes
Rationale: To provide the opportunity to explore colors and mixing them. To encourage color mixing with liquids.
Skills: Observation, prediction, fine motor, comparison, try out
We also have a color board displayed. Please feel free to bring in a variety of natural and non-natural materials such as leaves, tinsel, ribbons, orange peel, etc, to school so we can begin sorting and displaying them on the board by color. The colors will be sorted by Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, and Purple.

**Materials: Animal fur, stuffed woodland animals, winter animal visuals, animal books with winter and hibernation themes
Rationale: To act out, make sense of, and discuss the process and reason for hibernation and how animals survive in the winter.
Skills: Ideas, discussion, observation, sensory input

**Materials: Snow and Ice in the playground.
Rationale: To compare, observe, mold, feel, and begin wondering the difference between snow and ice and what it is made out of. To begin thinking about what type of animals enjoy the cold.
Skills: Ideas, discussion, experimenting, observation, try out ideas, cause and effect, predicting.

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Household kitchen furniture, plates, bowls, cups, food, high chair, babies, baby clothes, blankets, bottles, and crib.
Rationale: To act out story lines of taking care of babies as Ayuko will begin discussing her pregnancy to the children. To provide an opportunity to symbolically represent the children's experiences or curiosity of taking care of babies, making, and serving food for themselves and others.
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.


**Materials: Wooden trains, airplanes, cars, maps, post-it notes, small pictures of airplanes to stick on the map.
Rationale: To provide an opportunity to reenact some of the travel experiences the children may have had over winter break.
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills


Math and Manipulatives 

**Materials: Sewing blocks, counting matching game, seriation stackers, puzzles
Rationale: To support awareness of numbers and counting. To provide materials that support hand-eye coordination and fine motor control. To understand part to whole relationships in putting together a puzzle.
Skills: Counting, comparison, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination

Language and Literacy 

**Materials: A variety of books being displayed in different curriculum areas as well as the reading nook.

Rationale: To promote finding and applying new information in books to their knowledge and play, while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language. 

Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information, turn taking. 

Blocks 

**Materials: Hollow blocks and unit blocks.
Rationale: To encourage block building and make airports, houses, garage, train tracks, and bridges, to support the story lines of traveling.
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas

Large Motor 

**Materials: Indoors: basic gym set up for the first week.
Rationale: To provide and promote opportunities to engage in activities that enhance and challenge their physical skills.
Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, balance, coordination, symbolic representation, creativity, turn-taking

**Materials: Outdoors: Sleds, buckets, shovels, looking for and making tracks.
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills including a focus on balancing coordination skills. To facilitate activities that promote usage of snow and ice.
Skills: Fine and large motor, body manipulation, physical fitness, hand-eye coordination, cause and effect, turn-taking

Large group 

**Materials: Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), reading "Snowy Day" by Ezra Jack Keats, dance and instrument activities, modeling of activities
Rationale: To introduce the children to the new student teachers. To sings songs that are familiar to them as they get used to the school routine again.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music 

**Materials: Piano, drums, and shakers. 

Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To promote social interaction by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play
Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.

Snacks
Tuesday: Pretzels and milk
Friday: Apples and Rice cakes

November 29-December 3
Jessica Lead Teaching

Overview:
As our fall session is quickly coming to an end, our focus this week will be on preparing the children for winter break and the new student teachers. We will be having our goodbye snack along with a visit from the new student teachers to give the children an opportunity to meet them before break starts. We will be discussing the upcoming transitions with the children during large group and snack time. Another goal of this week is to focus on the cold and snowy weather that is upon us. We will be discussing what animals do to survive in the winter and emphasize the concept of hibernation throughout different areas of the classroom. The children have continued to form positive relationships with one another. Activities will be highlighted that support their growing social interactions that emphasize collaboration and working together.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: Cake watercolors, tabletop easels, brushes, and paper
Rationale: To introduce a new type of watercolor. To continue promote creative expression while encouraging social interaction during the painting experience
Skills: Fine motor, try out new things, color recognition, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.

**Materials: Letters and picture stamps, ink, thin markers, and large tabletop paper
Rationale: To provide the opportunity to experiment and creatively express oneself with stamping. To create artwork in collaboration with other children.
Skills: Fine motor, try out new ideas, creativity, persistence, artistic expression.

Sensory
**Materials: Natural Clay, rolling pins, cutting tools, plastic woodland animals, visuals of woodland animals, and their tracks.
Rationale: To continue making and comparing impressions of various animals footprints. To foster creativity in forming molds that represent animal necessities including shelter, food, and protection (fur).
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, creativity

**Materials: Sand, water containers, various molds, rakes, scoops
Rationale: To explore with adding different amounts of water to sand. To continue building structures from the sand and making imprints with hands and molds.
Skills: Sensory input, turn-taking, comparison, observation, imitation, prediction, trying out new ideas, fine motor

Science
**Materials: Magnetic wands, metal objects, magnets and magnet board
Rationale: To provide the opportunity to explore and learn about the properties of magnets. To encourage the children to test whether or not different objects are magnetic.
Skills: Observation, prediction, comparison, try out

**Materials: Animal fur, stuffed woodland animals, winter animal visuals, animal books with winter and hibernation themes
Rationale: To discuss the process and reason for hibernation and how animals survive in the winter
Skills: Ideas, discussion, observation, sensory input

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Grocery store food items, shopping carts, grocery bags, shopping lists, credit cards, credit card swipes, household kitchen furniture, plates, bowls, cups
Rationale: To introduce the idea of shopping at a grocery store. To encourage children to make a home-school connection with a familiar errand. To provide an opportunity to symbolically represent the children's previous experiences at grocery stores and the kitchen.
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.

**Please bring in empty boxes/packages of familiar food items that your child enjoys eating (cereal boxes, Mac and Cheese, etc)

**Materials: "train" chairs in the loft area, pictures of trains, instruments
Rationale: Provide an opportunity for the children to use their imaginations to create a train ride scenario.
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills


Math and Manipulatives 

**Materials: Animal sorting activity, part-to-whole puzzles
Rationale: To challenge children to recognize and sort the animals by two characteristics (size and color). To understand part to whole relationships in putting together a puzzle.
Skills: sorting, comparison, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination

Language and Literacy 

**Materials: Books about winter and hibernation in "Reading Cave"

Rationale: To promote finding and applying new information in books while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language. 

Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information, turn taking. 


**Materials: Letter stamps
Rationale: To promote alphabetic awareness and letter recognition in an artistic way. Encourage children to find the letters that are in their name.
Skills: Alphabetic awareness, artistic expression, phonological awareness

**Materials: Teacher made grocery lists and notepads and markers
Rationale: To encourage writing and reading to promote letter, word, and number recognition in the grocery store.
Skills: writing, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness

Blocks 

**Materials: Trains, wooden train tracks, hollow blocks
Rationale: To introduce toy trains and provide the opportunity to experiment with moving the trains at different speeds and directions. To promote train track building in collaboration with others.
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas

Large Motor 

**Materials: Indoors- rolling hill, jumping area, climbing wall, stairs, donut hole, monkey bars, and mats; large group parachute activities led by teachers
Rationale: To provide the children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills. To provide opportunities for the children to practice rolling and climbing in addition to strengthening their upper and lower bodies. To focus on coordination and balance through jumping and rolling activities.
Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, balance, coordination, symbolic representation, creativity, turn-taking

**Materials: Outdoors- teeter-totter, hula hoops, scavenger hunt activity, buckets, shovels,
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills including a focus on balancing coordination skills. To facilitate a scavenger hunt that requires the children to explore different areas of the playground environment.
Skills: Fine and large motor, body manipulation, physical fitness, hand-eye coordination, cause and effect, turn-taking

Large group 

**Materials: Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), story telling, dance and instrument activities, modeling of activities
Rationale: To continue preparing the children for the transitions ahead including new student teachers and winter break. To expand on specific topics of interest (hibernation and winter) through sharing a common experience.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music 

**Materials: Piano, bells, tambourines, rainsticks, shakers 

Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To promote social interaction and community by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play
Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.

Snack
Tuesday: Rolls and Milk
Friday: Apples and rice cakes

Ayuko's 2AM Classroom 

November 15-19 

Nora Lead Teaching


Overview: The children have shown increased interest in their growing bodies. Through dance and song activities they have been able to further explore their body and its capabilities. To follow up on this interest we will continue to introduce a variety of movement and rhythmic activities and encourage the children to observe, compare, and record a variety of measurements such as their height and size of their hands. We have recently found the children taking notice of numbers as they count various objects both individually, such as toy cars and other manipulatives, and during large group activities and songs. The classroom will be arranged to begin focusing on number concepts. As the weather gets colder, the children will also be practicing the number sequence and steps needed to dress for the outdoors with added layers and accessories. As Thanksgiving break is fast approaching, we find that some families travel to see their extended family members and friends. If you are going to be away for the Thanksgiving break, please let the teachers know if your child will miss class. Also, we would love to hear where you are going and how you will get there (via plane ride, train, etc) so we may incorporate this into our lessons and to prepare the children for any changes in schedule.

Expressive Arts 

**Materials: A variety of liquid water colors, brushes, and paper at the easel
Rationale: To provide an opportunity to experiment with new paint consistencies; to provide an additional outlet for creative expression
Skills: Fine motor, color recognition, symbolic representation, creativity, artistic expression.
**Materials: Stencils, markers, and colored paper. 

Rationale: To promote fine motor coordination and continue to practice tracing as an artistic expression

Skills: Persistence, hand-eye coordination, try out new ideas, risk-taking
**Materials: Natural Clay, rolling pins, cutting tools, and plastic animals

Rationale: To further explore the consistency of clay and the impression various footprints leave in the material. To create lasting molds to symbolically represent their ideas and creativity
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, creative expression, manual dexterity, observation, creativity

Sensory 

**Materials: Sand, water, various molds, containers, scoops
Rationale: To explore using both dry and wet sand to make structures. To compare and contrast between the two textures
Skills: Sensory input, turn-taking, comparison, observation, imitation, prediction, trying out new ideas

Science 

**Materials: Small objects of various weights (both light and heavy), large fans, ribbons, tabletop rulers

Rationale: To observe and experiment the power of breath, wind, and fans in the movement of materials of various weights. To begin learning how to measure and record the distance of the movement of materials.
Skills: Observation, comparison, prediction, measurement, turn taking, trying new ideas, recording

**Materials: Kites made of plastic bags and yarn [outside]
Rationale: To construct hand-made kites and to explore the effects various wind patterns have on the movement of objects
Skills: Cause and effect, prediction, observation, comparison

Dramatic Play 

**Materials: Familiar kitchen furniture, table, plastic baked goods, plastic and cardboard coffee cups, condiments
Rationale: To further explore an emerging interest of "drinking" and "ordering" coffee, the classroom restaurant will be converted into a neighborhood coffee shop. To encourage the exchange of items between children using various roles, such as customer or server
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.

***Please bring in any left over coffee cups when you are done with them to add to our "neighborhood coffee shop!"

Math and Manipulatives 


**Materials: Measuring wall (to measure and explore height), various sized hand and foot prints, tabletop ruler near fan
Rationale: To give the children opportunities to compare and record how their bodies continue to grow; to record and compare the strength of wind and air using a variety of objects.
Skills: Counting, recording, observing, comparing, turn taking, persistence, numbers
**Materials: Montessori seriation pegs, train puzzles, "Dressing Dolls" (later in the week), zippers.
Rationale: To challenge children to use problem-solving skills to order and place pegs according to size and shape. To become familiar with self-help skills such as buttoning, zipping, and snapping clothing items.
Skills: Problem solving, seriation, persistence, fine motor control, hand-eye coordination, comparison

Language and Literacy 

**Materials: Books about our growing bodies and numbers in the new "Reading Cave"

Rationale: To promote finding and applying new information in books while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language. 

Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, numerical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information, turn taking. 

**Materials: Large cards outlining steps of getting ready for outside (hat, mittens, etc.)
Rationale: To provide a visual representation outlining the sequence of steps needed to prepare for going outside.
Skills: Follow directions, alphabetic awareness, sequencing, self-help skills
**Materials: Menus with prices, notepads, markers, credit cards and machine

Rationale: To encourage writing and reading to promote letter, word, and number recognition in the coffee shop and kitchen
Skills: Fine motor, writing, alphabetical awareness, numerical awareness, vocabulary expansion 


Blocks 

**Materials: Various sized wooden boards and ramps, hollow blocks, small cars, cardboard "trains"
Rationale: To further explore building road structures such as tunnels and bridges of various heights; to continue to foster experimenting with weight, balance, and height; to create "trains" and other vehicles out of recycled materials
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creativity, symbolic representation, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), try out new ideas

Large Motor 

**Materials: Indoors- climbing wall, slide, stairs, A-frame and balancing beams, donut hole, monkey bars, basketball hoops, balls, and mats; large group activities led by teachers
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills. To provide opportunities for the children to practice climbing and strengthen their upper and lower bodies. To focus on receptive skills including throwing, catching, and grasping. 

Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, hand-eye coordination, receptive skills (throwing, grasping, reaching, catching), balance, visual/spatial discrimination, symbolic representation, creativity, turn-taking
**Materials: Outdoors- yellow race cars, wagons, buckets, shovels, basketball hoop, balls, sand molds
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills including a focus on propulsion skills through riding the trikes. To encourage the children to make creations out of the sand with the variety of molds and buckets.
Skills: Fine and large motor, body manipulation, physical fitness, hand-eye coordination, cause and effect, turn-taking
***Materials: Outdoors- Kites made of plastic bags and yarn
Rationale: To facilitate further exploration and inquiry in the (unpredictable) windy weather; to examine how the wind and varying weather conditions affects them when they move
Skills: Observation, comparison, large and fine motor,

Large group 

**Materials: Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), story telling, dance and instrument activities, modeling of activities
Rationale: To expand on specific topics of interest (body awareness) through sharing a common experience. To practice a routine and be part of a community of learners. 

Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music 

**Materials: Piano, bells, tambourines, xylophone, interactive music PowerPoint, guitar, maracas 

Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To allow the children an opportunity to use the computer to choose different instrument sounds to listen to the sounds instruments make. To promote social interaction and community by encouraging the children to play instruments both in large group and during free play
Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.



Snacks:

Tuesday: cucumbers and crackers
Friday: soy butter and graham crackers

Fall lesson plan - week of November 8th
Ayuko's 2AM Classroom
November 9-12
Courtney Lead Teaching

Overview: The children are continuing to form stronger relationships with one another and working together in the classroom. As we work to solidify the children's familiarity with one another, we will continue to facilitate social awareness by sharing common areas, promoting dramatic play, and offering a "matching" game with the children's faces to their name. The temperatures outside have continued to drop and the idea of wind is still being explored indoors and outside on the playground. We will begin focusing on the process of "preparing" to go outside when it is cold and all the steps that we take to get dressed after snack. Furthermore, we will continue to promote opportunities for the children to think about how wind affects objects and give them the opportunity to use "wind" to make objects move. Additionally, we will support and encourage literacy as the children begin spelling and recognizing the letters in their names. The children have recently expressed an interest in the topic of growing and getting "bigger." We will continue to foster this interest in a variety of ways to expand the children's body awareness through a variety of activities available during the week.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: A variety of colors, rollers, and paper
Rationale: To provide an opportunity to experiment with new painting tools. To encourage creativity through mixing colors and experimenting with different paint strokes.
Skills: Fine motor, hand-eye coordination self-expression, risk taking, observation, comparison, and promote social interaction.
**Materials: Scissors and paper with lines
Rationale: To promote fine motor skills of cutting and snipping. To experiment with different methods of cutting (little snips, longer cuts, straight-line cutting) on different lines of the paper. To give opportunities to "write" on the lined paper as the interests in writing names and words have increased.
Skills: fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, persistence, creative expression, patterns, writing, heuristic language, and alphabetic awareness.

Sensory
**Materials: Natural Clay, rolling pins, cutting tools.
Rationale: To introduce and explore a natural material that can be molded and sculpted. To experience the different properties of clay.
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, creative expression, alphabetic awareness, symbolic representation, manual dexterity
**Materials: sand, scoops, rakes, sifters, shells, rocks, plastic insects, and paddlewheels
Rationale: To explore and experiment with sand by using different tools and containers to excavate and collect.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, measurement, experimentation, math skills (spatial relations and volume), comparison, prediction, fine motor, and creativity.

Science
**Materials: Ribbons, cotton, leaves, feathers, light materials, and heavy materials.
Rationale: To experiment with creating our own "wind" by using a large fan to move light objects and test heavier objects.
Skills: Observation, comparison, try out, prediction, cause and effect.
**Materials: Plastic and stuffed animal birds, basket nests, acorns, seeds, pictures of birds (highlighting the feeding process).
Rationale: To continue to support the children's interest in various types of birds, their habitats, and the process of caretaking of baby birds through dramatic play scenarios and creating bird feeders.
Skills: Creative Expression, observation, role play, social skills, classification, comparison, prediction.
**Materials: Sunflower seeds, pine cones, soy butter, paper bags, string, bird seed.
Rationale: To continue to support the children's interest in birds and the process of feeding the birds outside our classroom by creating our own bird feeders.
Skills: Observation, cause and effect, prediction, comparison, try out ideas.

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Familiar kitchen furniture, table, plastic foods highlighting those that encourage serving (pizza, part to whole plastic fruits/vegetables, cake, cupcakes), serving trays, silverware, plates, bowls, cups, pitchers, menus, aprons, notepad (to take orders), and writing tools.
Rationale: To continue to encourage the children's interest in being in a restaurant setting. To support acting out scenarios of "preparing" and "serving" various foods and drinks to others. To support and promote writing and taking food orders (asking questions) from other children, and serving (sharing).
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.
***Please continue to let the teachers know if your child has any favorite restaurants/coffee shops or specific restaurant experiences you would like to share to make our classroom restaurant more personal and familiar to the children.

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Sorting shells, bugs, rocks etc ("buried" in the sand table)
Rationale: To give the children opportunity to group, sort, and count the different objects they find buried in the sand.
Skills: Fine motor control, visual and spatial discrimination, one-to-one correspondence, grouping and ordering, counting, turn taking, manual dexterity.
**Materials: Measuring wall (to measure and explore height), small to large hand and foot prints placed on the floor and table of the classroom.
Rationale: To give the children opportunity to explore and record how our bodies grow.
Skills: Give and ask for information, speaking, counting, keeping record, measurements, seriation, visual and spatial discrimination.

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Books related to the wind, cold weather, construction and growing (body awareness).
Rationale: To promote finding resources and new information in books while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language.
Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information.
**Materials: Letter matching game to spell out the children's names or initials
Rationale: To continue to support knowledge of symbol and representational systems. To promote alphabetical awareness, name recognition, and letter formations and letter matching.
Skills: fine motor, reading, writing, alphabet awareness, and vocabulary expansion
**Materials: Menus, notepads and markers
Rationale: To encourage writing and reading to promote letter and word recognition in the restaurant area.
Skills: fine motor, writing, alphabetical awareness, and vocabulary expansion
**Materials: Construction paper, markers, tape
Rationale: To encourage writing and reading the signs the children want to make for their roads and construction areas.
Skills: fine motor, writing, alphabetical awareness, and vocabulary expansion

Blocks
**Materials: various sized wooden ramps, hollow blocks, wood blocks, wooden planks, various wheels, small trucks, cars, and road signs.
Rationale: To promote road building with different surfaces (ramps, tunnels, streets). To continue to foster experimenting with speed, weight, direction, acceleration and slope.
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creative expression, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), scientific skill, experimenting, reasoning.

Large Motor
**Materials: Indoors- climbing wall, slide, stairs, A-frame and balancing beams, donut hole, monkey bars, basketball hoops, balls, and mats.
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills. To provide opportunities for the children to practice climbing and upper and lower body strength. To focus on receptive skills including throwing, catching, and grasping.
Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, hand-eye coordination, receptive skills (throwing, grasping, reaching, catching), balance, visual/spatial discrimination
**Materials: Outdoors- trikes, wagons, buckets, shovels, sand molds, ribbons with handles
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills including a focus on propulsion skills through riding the trikes. To encourage the children to make creations out of the sand with the variety of molds and buckets. To use the ribbons with handles to experiment how the wind affects them when they move.
Skills: Fine and large motor, body manipulation, physical fitness, hand-eye coordination, cause and effect.

Large group
**Materials: Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), story telling, modeling of activities
Rationale: To expand on specific topics of interest (birds, wind, growing, and winter clothing) through sharing a common experience. To practice a routine and be part of a community of learners.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music
**Materials: Piano, bells, tambourines, xylophone, interactive music PowerPoint, posted song selections.
Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To allow the children an opportunity to use the computer to choose different instrument sounds to listen to the sounds instruments make. To promote social interaction and community by encouraging the children to use the instruments in the cave while singing a familiar song together.
Skills: Creative expression and movement, mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.

Snacks:
Tuesday: Bananas and graham crackers
Friday: Oven fries and milk.

Fall lesson plan - week of November 2
Lesson Plan-Ayuko's 2AM Classroom
Jessica Lead Teaching

Overview: We are now into the seventh week and the children are continuing to become more comfortable and are forming relationships with one another. We will be continuing to have a strong emphasis on literacy and mathematical development throughout a variety of activities in the classroom. To encourage social interactions and collaboration with one another, the dramatic play area will be expanded into an area that will promote working together and sharing in experiences. The weather is continuing to change and the wind and cold weather is upon us. We will continue to promote opportunities for the children to think about how wind affects objects and how they can create their own "wind." Their interest in birds has continued to emerge and they have shown a growing interest in bird eggs and the hatching process. We will continue to foster this interest in a variety of ways to expand the children's knowledge and interest in bird life.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: Colored play dough, rolling pins, a variety of molds (such as turtles and houses), Alphabet cookie cutters, cutting tools, name cards
Rationale: To continue to promote literacy and letter awareness with the letter cookie cutters and name cards. To encourage the use of a variety of molds to represent objects and ideas. To encourage cutting with tools to make different marks and shapes.
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, creative expression, alphabetic awareness, symbolic representation.

**Materials: Primary paint colors, sponge brushes, and paper
Rationale: To provide an opportunity to experiment with new painting tools. To encourage creativity through mixing colors and experimenting with different paint strokes.
Skills: Fine motor, hand-eye coordination self-expression, risk taking, observation, comparison, and promote social interaction.

**Materials: 4x4 grid paper, various colored bingo stampers, and markers
Rationale: To continue the practice of creating patterns and shapes, such as circles, and to encourage one to one correspondence.
Skills: Fine motor, counting, one to one correspondence, patterns

**Materials: Scissors and paper with lines
Rationale: To promote fine motor skills of cutting and snipping. To experiment with different methods of cutting (little snips, longer cuts, straight-line cutting) on different lines on the paper
Skills: fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, persistence, creative expression.

Sensory
**Materials: Shaving cream and trays.
Rationale: To explore the texture and smell of a new material that allows them to use their hands and fingers.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, manual dexterity, comparison, try out

**Materials: sand, scoops, rakes, sifters, and paddlewheels
Rationale: To explore and experiment with sand by using different tools and containers
Skills: Sensory input, observation, measurement, familiarity with new materials, experimentation, math skills (spatial relations and volume), comparison, prediction, and fine motor.

Science 

**Materials: Ribbons, cotton, leaves, feathers, light materials.
Rationale: To experiment with creating our own "wind" by blowing and using fans to move light objects.
Skills: Observation, comparison, try out, prediction, cause and effect.
***If any families have any air pumping devices that are not sharp (for example, hand air pumps for balls) that you are willing to bring into the class it would be greatly appreciated. We hope to expand the idea of creating our own wind by having different devices available for the children to experiment with.

**Materials: Sticks, twine, natural materials, sunflower seeds, neutral colored play dough, tree stumps, real bird nests and eggs
Rationale: To continue to support the children's interest in birds and the process of making their own bird nests.
Skills: Observation, cause and effect, prediction, comparison, try out ideas. 


**Materials: Plastic and stuffed animal birds, basket nests, acorns, seeds, pictures of birds (highlighting the nesting and egg hatching process), and books about birds (in the Cave).
Rationale: To continue to encourage the children's interest in various types of birds, their habitats, and the process of hatching and caretaking of baby birds through dramatic play scenarios.
Skills: Observation, role play, social skills, classification, comparison, prediction, creative expression. 


Dramatic Play 

**Materials: Familiar kitchen furniture, table, plastic foods highlighting those that encourage serving (pizza, cuttable fruits/vegetables cake, cupcakes), serving trays, silverware, plates, bowls, cups, pitchers, menus, aprons, notepad (to take orders), and writing tools.
Rationale: The kitchen area will be extended to be a part of a restaurant setting to encourage the children's interest in preparing and serving various foods and drinks to others. To encourage and promote writing and taking food orders from other children.
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, collaboration, creative expression, cooperation, social skills.
***Please let the teachers know if your child has any favorite restaurants or specific restaurant experiences you would like to share to make our classroom restaurant more personal and familiar to the children.

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Pegs and pegboards, sorting bears
Rationale: To continue to encourage one-to-one correspondence and seriation with the pegs. To give the children opportunity to group, sort, and count the different colored sorting bears.
Skills: Fine motor control, visual and spatial discrimination, one-to-one correspondence, grouping and ordering, counting, seriation, turn taking, manual dexterity. 


Language and Literacy
**Materials: Books related to the birds, the changing weather (wind, rain, snow), and the alphabet
Rationale: To promote finding resources and new information in books while continuing to facilitate the development of the basic components of language.
Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language, give and ask for information.

**Materials: Letter cookie cutters, name cards, letter matching game
Rationale: To continue to support knowledge of symbol and representational systems. To promote alphabetical awareness, name recognition, and letter formations and letter matching.
Skills: fine motor, reading, writing, alphabet awareness, and vocabulary expansion

**Materials: Menus, notepads and markers
Rationale: To encourage writing and reading to promote letter and word recognition in the restaurant area.
Skills: fine motor, writing, alphabetical awareness, and vocabulary expansion

Blocks 

**Materials: various sized wooden ramps, hollow blocks, wood blocks, wooden planks, various wheels, small trucks, cars, and road signs.
Rationale: To promote road building with different surfaces (ramps, tunnels, streets). To continue to foster experimenting with speed, weight, direction, acceleration and slope.
Skills: Cooperation, collaboration, creative expression, large and fine motor, spatial concepts, construction skills (building), scientific skill, experimenting, reasoning.



Large Motor 

**Materials: Indoors- climbing wall, slide, stairs, A-frame and balancing beams, donut hole, monkey bars, basketball hoops, balls, and mats.
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills. To provide opportunities for the children to practice climbing and upper and lower body strength. To focus on receptive skills including throwing, catching, and grasping.
Skills: Upper and lower body strength, endurance, hand-eye coordination, receptive skills (throwing, grasping, reaching, catching), balance, visual/spatial discrimination

**Materials: Outdoors- trikes, wagons, buckets, shovels, sand molds, ribbons
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physicals skills including a focus on propulsion skills through riding the trikes. To encourage the children to make creations out of the sand with the variety of molds and buckets. To give the children the opportunity to see how the wind affects the ribbons that will be tied to different areas of the playground.
Skills: Fine and large motor, body manipulation, physical fitness

Large group 

**Materials: Songs and rhymes led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs and rhymes), guest dancers
Rationale: To expand on specific topics of interest (birds, wind, rain/snow) through sharing a common experience; practicing a routine and being part of a community of learners.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music

**Materials: Piano, drums, chimes, tambourines, interactive music PowerPoint
Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. To allow the children an opportunity to use the computer to chose different instrument sounds to listen to 

Skills: Mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.

Snacks: 

Tuesday: Pretzels and raisins
Friday: Cereal and milk

Fall lesson plan - week of October 26th
Lesson Plan-Ayuko's 2AM Classroom
October 26th-29th
Nora Lead Teaching

Overview: The children have started to form relationships and increasingly shown interest in one another. Specifically, the children are starting to become interested in their own names, as well as names of others in the class and various objects. To encourage this interest, literacy will be intentionally woven into the curriculum areas. Strong wind has been affecting us as the weather continues to change. We will highlight how wind is visible around us, both inside and outside. As the children are displaying their emerging interests in birds, nests, and each other, we will adapt the class environment to continue to stimulate and support these interests in various areas of the classroom.


Expressive Arts 

**Materials: Colored play dough, rolling pins, a variety of molds (such as turtles and houses), and Alphabet cookie cutters.
Rationale: To introduce the components of literacy and to encourage the use of a variety of molds to represent objects and ideas.
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, creative expression, alphabetic awareness, symbolic representation.
**Materials: Dark colored paper and chalk (at the easel). 

Rationale: To provide an opportunity for children to experience novel ways of writing and drawing. To form ideas and concepts.
Skills: Fine motor, self-expression, risk taking, observation, comparison, prediction. 

**Materials: Colored paper, laminated alphabet letters, various colored bingo stampers, and markers
Rationale: To continue the practice of creating shapes, such as circles, and to encourage early writing skills, such as the imitation of letter formations.
Skills: Fine motor, alphabetic awareness, writing, reading.

Sensory 

**Materials: Finger paint, finger painting paper, and trays.
Rationale: To explore creating artwork through a novel way, using one's own hands and fingers.
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, self-expression, risk taking, try out new ideas.
**Materials: two types of colored water, large funnels, funnel tube contraption, and a variety of containers. 

Rationale: To observe and experiment with movement of larger amounts of water using tubes, funnels, and paddle wheels. To continue to support the exploration of what happens when the colors are mixed together.
Skills: Sensory input, observation, measurement, familiarity with materials, experimentation, math skills (spatial relations), comparison, prediction, and fine motor.

Science 

**Materials: Ribbons, milkweed, feathers, light materials
Rationale: To experience the impact wind has on various materials on the playground and inside the classroom
Skills: Observation, comparison, try out ideas, prediction, cause and effect.
**Materials: Sticks, twine, neutral colored playdough, tree stumps, pictures of birds and foliage.
Rationale: To begin learning about how birds live and create bird nests. To encourage and support their understanding of how bird nests are made. 

Skills: Observation, cause and effect, prediction, comparison, try out ideas. 

**Materials: Pictures of birds, plastic and stuffed animal birds, basket nests, books about birds (in the Cave).
Rationale: To encourage the exploration, observation, and understanding of various types of birds through dramatic play.
Skills: Observation, role play, communication, classification, comparison, prediction. 


Dramatic Play 

**Materials: Familiar household kitchen furniture, baking ingredient packages (salt, flour, sugar, etc.), mixing bowls, cooking trays.
Rationale: To encourage further exploration and inquiry of baking interest shown in children.
Skills: Role play, symbolic representation, communication, cooperation, social skills.
**Materials: Baby dolls, clothing, strollers, bottles, plates, bibs.
Rationale: To encourage caretaking, baby dolls will be placed close to the kitchen area in order to be fed and cared for.
Skills: Fine motor, role play, symbolic representation, collaboration.



Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Puzzles, new seriation and color stackers, pegs and pegboards, Mr. Potato Head
Rationale: To provide opportunity to practice one-to-one correspondence, as well as seriation.
Skills: Fine motor control, visual and spatial discrimination, one-to-one correspondence, seriation, turn taking, manual dexterity. 


Language and Literacy
**Materials: Books related to the theme of Birds (in the bird cave), about wind and the changing weather, and about ramps.
Rationale: To encourage finding resources and new information in books (birds, wind, and ramps) while facilitating the development of the basic components of language.
Skills: Listening, speaking, reading, phonological awareness, alphabetical awareness, heuristic language.
**Materials: Letter cookie cutters, letter stencils.
Rationale: To begin increasing their knowledge of symbol and representational systems. To foster alphabetical awareness, name recognition, and letter formations.
Skills: fine motor, reading, writing, alphabet awareness, vocabulary expansion.
Blocks 

**Materials: Wooden ramps, various wheels, books about ramps, small trucks and cars.
Rationale: To facilitate awareness of physics, such as speed, weight, direction, acceleration and slope.
Skills: Reasoning, hypothesizing, experimenting, scientific skills, cooperation, spatial concepts, fine motor skills.
**Materials: Multicolored plastic blocks, hollow wood blocks, and foam blocks.
Rationale: To support scientific and mathematical skills of mass, balance, and spatial sense through the construction of additional ramps and building structures.
Skills: Initiative, creative expression, communication, collaboration, fine motor, mathematical and scientific concepts, cause and effect.


Large Motor 

**Materials: Indoors- plastic cars, tools and toolboxes, stairs, donut hole, bean bag board and bean bags; large group movement activities. Outside -ribbons added to fence, dump trucks, wheelbarrows, shovels and scoops, wooden boats.
Rationale: To provide children opportunities to engage in activities that challenge their physical skills; to encourage the development of cognitive skills, such as cause-and-effect through observation and experimentation with the wind and its effects on various materials, such as ribbon.
Skills: Physical fitness (endurance, strength, flexibility), following directions, observation and comparison, body manipulation.

Large group 

**Materials: Songs led by teacher (gather, name, and topic songs)
Rationale: To build awareness of a specific topic (Birds and Wind) through sharing a common experience; practicing a routine and being part of a community of learners.
Skills: Attention span, attending and orienting, respect for one another, following directions.

Music

**Materials: Piano, drums, and individual xylophones in music corner
Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction. 

Skills: Mathematical concepts (beats and patterns), imitation, call and answer, communication.

Snacks: 

Tuesday: TBD
Friday: Cooking with Courtney - cheesy biscuits

Fall lesson plan - week of October 19th
Lesson Plan-Ayuko's 2AM
Classroom October 19th-25th Courtney Lead Teaching

Overview: Going into the 5th week of school, the children seem to have settled into the routine of the classroom. We pay close attention to each child's interests in order to incorporate these into our daily curriculum and make their learning meaningful and fun. Therefore, the classroom environment is set to provide a variety of opportunities for the children to develop relationships, learn how to collaborate, and recognize diversity in ideas and their expression. As the children become familiar with one another, we will continue to facilitate social awareness by sharing common areas and beginning to learn each other's names. This week we will provide numerous artistic outlets for the children to express their ideas throughout the day. In addition, we will be promoting body awareness through various art, sensory, and music activities.
Expressive Arts
**Materials: Fall/Primary tempera paint colors, smaller/thinner paintbrushes.
Rationale: To explore a new type of brush to create thin strokes and precise markings on the paper.
Skills: Fine motor, self-expression, risk taking, try out new ideas.
**Materials: Brown play dough, rolling pins, and a variety of other tools that will help in their exploration of creating 3D "sculptures".
Rationale: To encourage the children to experience and practice molding and manipulating the play dough. To express their creativity and imagination.
Skills: Sensory input, fine motor, creative expression, math skills (proportions).
**Materials: Glue, Q-tips, colored paper, natural materials (leaves, sticks, acorns, pine cones, grass, etc).
Rationale: To use and feel the materials we see and find outside and create artistic expression. To explore the texture of glue and familiarize the children with the purpose and use of glue.
Skills: Fine motor, self-expression, problem solve, sensory input, risk taking, observation, comparison, prediction.
Sensory
**Materials: Water, red and blue food coloring, baster, and a variety of containers.
Rationale: To continue supporting the use of the baster for manual dexterity and transferring water. To observe and experiment with movement of water using tubes and funnels. To support the exploration of what happens when the colors are mixed together.
Skills: Observation, familiarity with materials, experimentation, math skills (volume, more, less), comparison, prediction, and fine motor.
**Materials: Various colors of finger paint, trays
Rationale: To allow the children to fulfill their curiosity of using their hands to feel, move, and mix the paint colors.
Skills: Sensory input, creative expression, and prediction
Science
**Materials: Mirrors on walls, flashlights, CDs, light table with color gels.
Rationale: To experiment with reflections, light, and shadows.
Skills: Observation, cause and effect, prediction, comparison, try out ideas.
**Materials: Real turtles, natural materials, terrarium
Rationale: To begin discussing the care of the turtles in our classroom, as well as observing their behavior.
Skills: Observation, ideas, reflection.
**Materials: Fall vegetables - pumpkins, gourds, squash, tomatoes, potatoes, and any other *vegetables to be brought in from home; magnifying glasses; knife (to be used by teachers), and cutting board.
Rationale: To further explore and investigate the harvested items by cutting them open and seeing the seeds.
Skills: observation, predication, classification, comparison, try out ideas, record.
Dramatic Play
**Materials: Loft "tree house/cave," squirrels and owls, smaller "cave" structures extended from the loft, large branches children will collect in nature, posted questions and books focusing on the squirrels and owls and their habitat in trees.
Rationale: To provide a space/cozy areas to foster pretend play and social interaction among students and teachers. To support their development in language, literacy, and promote emergent reading such as dictating a story from the pictures. To create an opportunity to learn about owls and the squirrels that live in the trees. To emphasize the animals' lifestyles and habitat.
Skills: Role play, creative expression, sensory input, cooperation, turn taking, and communication, symbolic representation, and social skills; phonological awareness, vocabulary expansion on the subject matter.
**Materials: Familiar household kitchen and baking items.
Rationale: To re enact the cooking experiences they have had by pretending to add, stir, and mix ingredients to create "baked goods."
Skills: Role play, communication, symbolic representation, cooperation, turn taking, and social skills.
**Materials: Baby items, multiethnic babies, moving trucks, front loaders, unit blocks, and cars.
Rationale: To support the children's interest in incorporating the blocks to build spaces for the babies while using the trucks to move and deliver the materials.
Skills: Turn taking, social skills, try out ideas, role play, social interactions, communication, symbolic representation, cooperation, scientific and mathematical concepts
Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Mr. Potato Heads, seriation and color stackers, and puzzles
Rationale: To promote fine motor development, shape and color differentiation, body awareness, and hand-eye coordination for spatial awareness.
Skills: Fine motor control, visual and spatial discrimination, turn taking, cooperation, manual dexterity.
Language and Literacy
**Materials: Alphabet signs, signs, questions, recipe cards (for cooking activity), story-lines, and related books posted in various curriculum areas and a variety of books on the book shelf. Books relating to owls, animals, and the change of seasons (hibernation, leaves, cold weather etc).
Rationale: To support their development in beginning role play, experience the basic components of language systems, and support understanding the changes of the season.
Skills: Communication, referencing, phonological awareness, observation, vocabulary expansion.
Blocks
**Materials: Square and rectangle multicolored blocks, hollow blocks, foam blocks, questions, and photos of children building.
Rationale: To support mathematical skills, social interaction, and collaborative building. To be incorporated into buildings, homes for the babies, homes for the animals, or roads for the vehicles located nearby.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, large motor, fine motor, expressive creation, mathematical and scientific concepts.
Large Motor
**Materials: Indoors - race car tracks, uneven surfaces, donut hole, stairs. Outside -rakes for raking large pile of leaves (to jump in), wooden wagons, trucks and diggers, hard hats, and tools for digging and molding sand.
Rationale: To support basic skills such as walking, climbing, balance, coordination, and upper and lower body development and promote cooperation, social interactions, trial and error, and role play.
Skills: Perceptual Motor Skills (spatial, temporal, directional, and body awareness) and physical fitness (cardio vascular endurance, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, and agility) Dramatic Play (acting out the jobs of the construction workers they have been observing for the past week).
Large group
**Materials: Name songs, turtle songs, books, upper arm movement activities.
Rationale: To follow a routine, help children learn each other's names, and promote a beginning sense of group, community, and collaboration.
Skills: fine motor development, hand eye coordination, listening, speaking, patience, taking turns, communication, and social skills.
Music - Music will be apparent throughout the day to support transitions and encourage participation.
**Materials: Piano, drums, tambourines, and shakers.
Rationale: To promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction.
Skills: Turn taking, fine motor development, large motor development, and mathematical concepts such as beats and patterns.

Snacks:
Tuesday: Cucumber slices and crackers

Lesson Plan-Ayuko's 2AM Classroom
Week of October 12th
Ayuko Lead Teaching
Overview: As children settle into the routine of the classroom, we continue to support them through the transitions and help them become aware of themselves and each other through positive interactions and problem solving. We will continue to explore what is happening outside, focusing on the changing foliage and on the behavior of animals in our environment. We will encourage and spur social interactions between children, as they learn how to share a common space and materials.
Expressive Arts
**Materials: Glue, Q-tips, colored paper, natural materials (leaves, sticks, acorns, pine cones, grass, etc).
Rationale: To use and feel the materials we see and find outside and create artistic expression. To explore the texture of glue and familiarize the children with the purpose and use of glue.
Skills: Fine motor, self-expression, problem solve, sensory input, risk taking, observation, comparison, prediction.
**Materials: Fall tempera paint colors, paper, various sized brushes.
Rationale: To experiment making various strokes and shapes using a variety of brushes.
Skills: Fine motor, self-expression, risk taking, try out new ideas, comparison.

Sensory
**Materials: Water, blue food coloring, basters, ice cube trays, and a variety of containers.
Rationale: To continue to promote experimentation with cause and effect with the basters. To explore what happens when blue color is added to the clear water.
Skills: Observation, familiarity with materials, math skills (volume and spatial relations), comparison, prediction, and fine motor.

**Materials: Scented playdough, cookie cutters, rolling pins, timer, oven, and "baking ingredients" (i.e. salt and oregano)
Rationale: To encourage the children to experience and practice adding, molding, stirring, and mixing ingredients to create baked goods. This will eventually lead up to a cooking activity at the play dough table where the children will participate in the making of pumpkin muffins.
Skills: Sensory input, creative expression, math skills (counting, measurement), fine motor

**Materials: Mini rain sticks/shakers.
Rationale: To promote experimentation with sound and how to produce sound. To challenge children's thinking while creating a satisfying trial and effect game with teachers and peers.
Skills: observation, trial and error, and sensory input.

Science
**Materials: Mirrors on walls, flashlights, light table with color gels.
Rationale: To experiment with reflections, light, and shadows.
Skills: observation, cause and effect, prediction, comparison, try out ideas.
**Materials: Introduction of real turtles, natural materials, terrarium
Rationale: To begin implementing the idea of hosting a real turtle in our class: what kind of care does it entail? How do we make its habitat?
Skills: Observation, ideas, try out.
**Materials: Fall vegetables and fruit - pumpkins, gourds, squash, tomatoes, potatoes, and any other vegetables brought in; magnifying glasses; knife (to be used by teachers) and cutting board.
Rationale: To further explore and investigate the harvested items by cutting them open and seeing the seeds.
Skills: observation, predication, classification, comparison, try out ideas, record.

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Loft "bear cave," squirrels, and other woodland animals (bears, rabbits, wolves), materials the children will collect in nature, various animal fur, posted questions and books focusing on the squirrels and other woodland animals.
Rationale: To provide a space/cozy area to foster an animal story line to promote pretend and symbolic play and support social interaction among students and teachers. To support their development in language, literacy, and promote emergent reading such as dictating a story from the pictures. To create an opportunity to learn about woodland animals native to Minnesota, emphasizing the animals' lifestyles to the changes in season.
Skills: Role play, creative expression, sensory input, cooperation, turn taking, and communication, symbolic representation, and social skills; listening, speaking, phonological awareness, vocabulary expansion on the subject matter.

**Materials: Familiar household kitchen, baby items, multiethnic babies, various dress-up clothes, and moving trucks, diggers, unit blocks, and cars.
Rationale: To support pretend play, symbolic play, foster social interaction and cooperative play.
Skills: Communication, cooperation, turn taking, role play, symbolic representation, and social skills.

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Face matching game, seriation and color stackers, natural material sorting activity, and puzzles.
Rationale: To promote fine motor development, facial recognition, shape and color differentiation, and hand-eye coordination for spatial awareness.
Skills: visual discrimination, turn taking, fine motor control.

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Signs, questions, storylines, and related books posted in various curriculum areas and a variety of books on the book shelf. Books relating to fall (hibernation, leaves, etc).
Rationale: To support their development in beginning role play, experience the basic components of language systems, and support understanding the changes of the season.
Skills: Listening, speaking, phonological awareness, observation, vocabulary expansion.

Blocks
**Materials: Square and rectangle unit blocks, hollow and cardboard blocks, and pictures of children building with blocks.
Rationale: To support mathematical skills, social interaction, and collaborative building. To be incorporated into buildings, homes for the babies, or roads for the vehicles located nearby.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, large motor, expressive creation, mathematical and scientific concepts.

Large Motor
**Materials: Indoors - race car tracks, uneven surfaces, donut hole, stairs. Outside - Rocking boat, rakes for raking leaves, wheel barrows, wooden wagon, and tools for digging and molding sand.
Rationale: To support basic skills such as walking, climbing, balance, coordination, and upper and lower body development and promote social interaction and role play.
Skills: Perceptual Motor Skills (spatial, temporal, directional, and body awareness) and physical fitness (cardio vascular endurance, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, and agility).

Large group
**Materials: Name songs, turtle songs, books, fingerplay.
Rationale: To begin a routine, familiarize the children with each other's names, and promote a beginning sense of group, community, and collaboration.
Skills: fine motor development, hand eye coordination, listening, speaking, patience, taking turns, communication, and social skills.

Music - Music will be apparent throughout the day to support transitions and encourage participation.
**Materials: Piano, drums, tone blocks, and shakers.
Rationale: to promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction.
Skills: turn taking, fine motor development, and mathematical concepts such as beats and patterns.

Snack
Tuesday: Bananas and graham crackers
Friday: Apples and pretzles

Lesson Plan-Ayuko's 2AM Classroom
Week of October 5th
Ayuko Lead Teaching

Overview: The children are slowly learning the routines of the classroom and are increasingly comfortable separating from their parents in the morning. We will continue to focus on building relationships among children and teachers by getting to know each others' names and finding a common thread through all forms of play. There will be few activities that incorporate the children's photos and names to encourage interaction among them and help us create a sense of community in the classroom. The play areas continue to be arranged to promote these goals and encourage the development of positive relationships with classmates and teachers.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: Scissors and crayons.
Rationale: To promote fine motor skills of cutting and snipping.
Skills: fine motor skills, hand-eye coordination, persistence, creative expression.

**Materials: Wooden paint brushes, paper, and fall paint colors.
Rationale: To explore new paint colors that resemble and reflect what we see outside.
Skills: Fine motor grip, hand-eye coordination, observation, comparison, self-expression, and promote social interaction.

**Materials: Scented play dough, cookie cutters, timer, oven, and natural materials (for toppings).
Rationale: To continue to encourage social interactions and creative expression and support the children's interest in baking. To promote the children's understanding of time and waiting.
Skills: Sensory input, creative expression, math skills (counting, measurement of time), fine motor

Sensory
**Materials: Basters and a variety of containers
Rationale: To promote experimentation with cause and effect and how the children can use the basters in the water.
Skills: Observation, familiarity with materials, math skills (volume and spatial relations), cause and effect, and fine motor.

**Materials: Four noise sticks.
Rationale: To promote experimentation with sound and how to produce sound. To challenge children's thinking while creating a satisfying trial and effect game with teachers and peers.
Skills: Physical coordination, observation, and sensory input.

Science
Materials: Visuals of frogs and turtles eating habits and lifestyle. Variety of foliage and plastic bugs, camouflaging frogs, and turtles.
Rationale: To observe and investigate the items in the terrarium using magnifying glasses. To begin thinking about what frogs and turtles eat and where they live. To provoke the idea of hosting a real turtle or frog in our class: what kind of care does it entail?
Skills: Observation, prediction, comparison, classification.

**Materials: Light table, leaves, sticks, milkweed, acorns, pumpkins, grass, rocks, etc; magnifying glasses.
Rationale: To experience, compare, and observe what we find outside at this time of year through awareness and exploration.
Skills: Observation, comparison, ideas, try out, record.

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Loft "bear cave", bears and other woodland animals (rabbits and squirrels), posted questions and books focusing on woodland animals.
Rationale: To provide a space/cozy area to foster an animal story line to promote pretend and symbolic play and support social interaction among students and teachers. To support their development in language, literacy, and promote emergent reading such as dictating a story from the pictures.
Skills: Role play, creative expression, sensory input, cooperation, turn taking, and communication, symbolic representation, and social skills; listening, speaking, phonological awareness, vocabulary expansion on the subject matter.

**Materials: Animal smocks, a variety of "furry" fabrics, and scarves.
Rationale: To encourage creative expression and pretend play in the "bear cave." To explore and discuss different textures of fabric.
Skills: Sensory input, creative expression, and role play.

**Materials: Familiar household kitchen, baby items, multiethnic babies, various dress-up clothes, and dump trucks and cars.
Rationale: To support pretend play, symbolic play, foster social interaction and cooperative play.
Skills: Communication, cooperation, turn taking, role play, symbolic representation, and social skills.

Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Face matching games, seriation and color stackers, tong sorting activity, and puzzles.
Rationale: To promote fine motor development, facial recognition, shape and color differentiation, and hand-eye coordination for spatial awareness.
Skills: visual discrimination, turn taking, fine motor control.

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Signs, questions, storylines, and related books posted in various curriculum areas and a variety of books on the book shelf. Books relating to fall (hibernation, leaves, etc).
Rationale: To support their development in beginning role play, experience the basic components of language systems, and support understanding the changes of the season.
Skills: Listening, speaking, phonological awareness, observation, vocabulary expansion.

Blocks
**Materials: Hollow and cardboard blocks and pictures of children building with blocks.
Rationale: To support mathematical skills, social interaction, and collaborative building. To be incorporated into buildings or roads for the vehicles located nearby.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, large motor, expressive creation, mathematical and scientific concepts.

Large Motor
**Materials: Indoors - Climbing equipments, stairs, slide, and rocking boat. Outside - Natural materials such as grass, plants, and trees, wooden house, picnic table, slide, rakes for raking leaves, wheel barrows, and tools for digging and molding sand.
Rationale: To support basic skills such as jumping, climbing, balance, coordination, and upper and lower body development and promote social interaction and role play.
Skills: Perceptual Motor Skills (spatial, temporal, directional, and body awareness) and physical fitness (cardio vascular endurance, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, and agility).

Large group
Materials: name songs, fall songs, books, fingerplay.
Rationale: To begin a routine, familiarize the children with each other's names, and promote a beginning sense of group, community, and collaboration.
Skills: fine motor development, hand eye coordination, listening, speaking, patience, taking turns, communication, and social skills.

Music - Music will be apparent throughout the day to support transitions and encourage participation.
**Materials: Piano, drums, and shakers.
Rationale: to promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction.
Skills: turn taking, fine motor development, and mathematical concepts such as beats and patterns.

Snacks:
Tuesday: Pretzels and Milk
Friday: Apples and Graham crackers

Lesson Plan-Ayuko's 2AM Classroom
Weeks of 9/21 and 9/28
Ayuko Lead Teaching

Overview: The first couple of weeks we will focus on helping the children say goodbye to their families and adjusting them to the school environment. As the children explore and investigate the classroom, we hope they begin to think positively of the teachers and school. Slowly we will begin to learn the routines of the classroom and give children the support they need to make transitions throughout the morning. The play areas are arranged to promote these goals and encourage the development of positive relationships with classmates and teachers.

Expressive Arts
**Materials: Wooden paint brushes, paper, and primary color paints
Rationale: To explore brush strokes and color mixing.
Skills: Fine motor grip, creative expression, and hand-eye coordination.
**Materials: Paper, markers, stickers, and scissors.
Rationale: To explore the properties of a variety of art materials.
Skills: Fine motor control, creative expression, and hand-eye coordination.
**Materials: Playdough and a variety of molding tools.
Rationale: To produce an outlet for creative expression and promote social interaction.
Skills: Fine motor development (squeezing, poking, and pinching), observation, generating ideas, and sensory input.

Sensory
**Materials: Water, measuring cups, large and small jars.
Rationale: To encourage a practice of pouring and filling and develop the concept of empty and full, less and more, and in and out. To encourage social awareness as children notice what those across from them are doing with the same materials
Skills: Observation, math skills (volume and spatial relations), comparison, prediction, and fine motor.
**Materials: Four noise sticks.
Rational: To promote experimentation with sound and how to produce sound. To challenge children's thinking while creating a satisfying trial and effect game with teachers and peers.
Skills: Physical coordination, observation, and sensory input.

Science
**Materials: Variety of foliage and camouflaging frogs and turtles.
Rationale: To observe and investigate the items in the terrarium using magnifying glasses. To provoke the idea of hosting a real turtle or frog in our class: what kind of care does it entail.
Skills: Observation, prediction, comparison, classification.
**Materials: Natural materials such as bark, skin of a birch tree, and a large pine cone.
Rationale: To observe and feel the texture of the natural materials that are found in their everyday lives.
Skills: Observation, exploration, record, try out, and comparison.

Dramatic Play
**Materials: Familiar household kitchen, baby items, multi-ethnic babies, various dress-up clothes, and dump trucks and cars.
Rationale: To support pretend play, symbolic play, foster social interaction and cooperative play.
Skills: Communication, cooperation, turn taking, role play, symbolic representation, and social skills.
**Materials: Scarves, pillow, and books.
Rationale: To promote social interaction, peek-a-boo games, and provide a room/cozy area to read and relax.
Skills: Social skills, turn taking, and communication.
**Materials: Farm animals (horses, cows, pigs, rabbits, and cats) and "feed."
Rationale: To stimulate pretend play, reflect on a trip to the state fair, and promote social interaction among the children and teachers.
Skills: Social skills, cooperation, communication, turn taking, and role play.
Math and Manipulatives
**Materials: Shape sorters, seriation and color stackers, and puzzles.
Rationale: To promote fine motor development, shape and color differentiation, and hand-eye coordination for spatial awareness.
Skills: visual discrimination, turn taking, fine motor control.

Language and Literacy
**Materials: Signs, questions, and related books posted in various curriculum areas and a variety of books on the book shelf.
Rationale: To support their development in language, literacy, and emergent reading, such as the process of independently turning pages in a book and dictating a story from the pictures.
Skills: Listening, speaking, phonological awareness, vocabulary expansion.

Blocks
**Materials: Hollow and cardboard blocks.
Rationale: To support mathematical skills, social interaction, and collaborative building. To be incorporated into buildings or roads for the vehicles located nearby.
Skills: Communication, collaboration, large motor, expressive creation, mathematical and scientific concepts.
Large Motor
**Materials: Indoors - Climbing equipments, stairs, slide, and rocking boat. Outside - Natural materials such as grass, plants, and trees, wooden house, picnic table, slide, and tools for digging and molding sand.
Rationale: To support basic skills such as jumping, climbing, balance, coordination, and upper and lower body development and promote social interaction and role play.
Skills: Perceptual Motor Skills (spatial, temporal, directional, and body awareness) and physical fitness (cardio vascular endurance, muscular strength and endurance, flexibility, and agility).
Large group
**Materials: name songs, books, fingerplay.
Rationale: To begin a routine, familiarize the children with each other's names, and promote a beginning sense of group, community, and collaboration.
Skills: fine motor development, hand eye coordination, listening, speaking, patience, taking turns, communication, and social skills.

Music - Music will be apparent throughout the day to support transitions and encourage participation.
**Materials: Piano
Rationale: to promote exploration of sound, volume, rhythm and social interaction.
Skills: turn taking, fine motor development, and mathematical concepts such as beats and patterns.

Snacks:
Tuesday 9/21 and Friday 9/24 - grain based food, apples, milk and water.
Tuesday 9/28: TBD
Friday 10/1: TBD